The bastards at American Airlines go to war

yes, they ARE bastards... amr wants to emasculate the unions and is relying on a business-friendly judicial environment to do it for them...

AMR Fires Opening Shot In Court Battle

American Airlines kicked off a week-long court hearing on its bid to abandon union contracts, telling a judge on Monday that its bankrupt parent, AMR, cannot survive without major concessions from its workforce. Hundreds of people, including lawyers and airline workers, filled the courtroom and two overflow rooms in US Bankruptcy Court in Manhattan for the start of the hearing, as other unionised workers rallied outside the courthouse. Cordoned off by police, the workers held signs and chanted for fairer work terms and against AMR's plan to cut about 13,000 union jobs. AMR wants to convince Judge Sean Lane not only that it desperately needs labour concessions, but that its unions have unreasonably rejected prior attempts to negotiate those concessions. AMR filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in November, citing uncompetitive labour costs. In opening statements, AMR lawyer Jack Gallagher said the company needs 20 percent across-the-board reductions in employee costs, half of which must come from medical benefits.

bankruptcy should be a chance to make things right, not a hunting license...

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Romney's Bain & Co., a job "cremator," now advising American Airlines on how to kill their unions, their pensions and their workforce

ain't this sweet...

As Mitt Romney campaigns in today’s Florida presidential primary, airline workers have been following him with a message about one of his old company’s newest clients: Airline giant AMR, the parent company of American Airlines and American Eagle. AMR, which filed for bankruptcy in November, last week announced plans to retain the advice of Bain & Co., the consulting firm where Romney worked before co-founding private equity firm Bain Capital in 1985.

“He’s talking about creating jobs,” says Transport Workers Union President James Little, but “he’s not a job creator. He’s a job cremator.” TWU represents 24,000 members at American Airlines and American Eagle whose jobs and benefits are threatened in the bankruptcy process.

AMR’s retention of Bain (for consulting on its American Eagle subsidiary) came out the same week as news that AMR had contributed less than $7 millionhttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif to its pension fund, out of a normally required $100 million, for the month of January. Days later, AMR increased its contribution. “I have a hard time sitting back,” says Little, “when the company is taking hard-earned money…to pay $525,00 a month to have this company come in and tell them how to cut heads.”

[...]

Reporter Terry Maxon predicted Sunday in the Dallas Morning News that AMR’s proposal tomorrow will include replacing all pensions with a 401(k), outsourcing thousands of jobs, and requiring employees to pay more of the cost of their health insurance. Maxon says those predictions were based on “conversations, management proposals in contract talks and what other airlines adopted” in their own bankruptcies.

this has all the makings of a deadly cocktail for romney, bain and american... unfortunately, american employees and retirees will still be the ones who get screwed...

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