"Back to the future with Wilbur and Orville"

Sunday, November 3, 2002

Back to the future with Wilbur and Orville
The Pittsburgh (PA) Tribune-Review


Next year we will commemorate 100 years of a revolution brought about by
two independent-minded individuals who accomplished what they did
without any assistance from the government, giant corporations or
financial institutions. 

On Dec. 17, 1903, a powered airplane flew for the first time in Kill
Devil Hills, N.C. Two self-taught engineers, brothers Wilbur and Orville
Wright, built the plane from wood and canvas - and financed their vision
from their bicycle shop in Dayton, Ohio. 

Planes had been imagined as far back as Leonardo da Vinci's drawings,
but it took the meticulous and sustained work of these two American
geniuses to create a machine that actually flew 120 feet. Now, a century
later, thousands of these machines transport millions of people every
day across oceans and around the world. Airlines have become a major
global industry, and airplanes are vital to every nation's security and
defense plans as well as being crucial to trade and leisure industries. 

And, as with many other major industries, it hasn't escaped entanglement
from the government and the corporate world. 

GOVERNMENT OVERKILL 

The use of airplanes by the al-Qaida network in last year's attacks on
New York City and Washington showed the world the vulnerability of
America's airline companies. To shore up the industry, the government
took the worst possible action and granted aid in the form of massive
subsidies to some U.S.-based carriers. These subsidies had an unintended
effect: Instead of providing support in a time of need, they concealed
the disorganized state of this vital industry. 

One of the problems with the airline industry is its pay scale - one of
the primary in the world. Wages are any airline's highest expense -
nearly 37 percent of every budget. And what wages! Pilots earn an
average of $169,000 a year, with some senior pilots earning as much as
$250,000. Others on the payroll - from navigators and engineers through
the flight crew and ground staff to gate agents and cleaners - make on
average $67,000 -more than $1,112 per week. 

The reason is simple - the union. The airline industry has a union or
"association" membership of some 72 percent of its work force. Compare
this with other unions in the United States that count on about 8
percent of the people in a given industry belonging. 

But the airline unions do their members proud. Just read their
newsletters. They tell you how to travel for free, how to upgrade
yourself from economy to first class, the best ways to improve medical
and dental care and never, ever to be late paying your union dues. 

Now we know why the Airline Pilot's Association is known as the Airline
Pirate's Association. 

All this helps explain our exorbitant air ticket. And what do we get in
return? 

HUB-AND-SPOKE HORRORS 

First, we get the Hub-and-Spoke system. In the 1980s, one particular
airline, long since out of business, invented the concept of collecting
passengers from inconvenient locations, taking them to distant cities
where they didn't want to go and then sending them off to a final
destination. To the airline it meant more profits; to us it meant more
delays and longer travel. 

It also meant expensive gate space for the aircraft and strange
schedules for the crews. In addition, the schedules (designed for long
spells with airline staff doing nothing interspersed with short bursts
of intense activity) are calculated to increase tension and stress for
the paying customer. Additional miles earned per segment are poor solace
for the truly frequent traveler. 

What else do we get? Overcrowded airports, long lines for security
checks, seat assignments that sometimes take longer than the flight and
fewer flights with cramped seating. We also get delays and
cancellations, work slowdowns or sick-outs by one union or another and
disruptions not only to our plans but to those who rely on the airlines
for cargo deliveries. It's the antithesis of customer service. 

We also have to endure a lot of whining from the airlines about fewer
customers due to the see-saw economy and the fear of flying generated by
9/11. We are subject to being screened and profiled by $7-an-hour
"security staff" who feel us, pat us and take our shoes off. (The San
Francisco feelers and patters get $11.25 an hour.) It's all done in the
name of security. Their performances, while doing nothing to help make
us feel more secure, are something to see. Watch them in action and you
would think the profile of potential hijackers includes a mother
traveling with three children under the age of 10 and a grandfather with
hearing problems, arthritis and a walker. 

WORST TO COME? 

The chaos promises to get worse. There's talk that United Airlines may
file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection because its appeal to pilots
for wage concessions was met with agreement to cut salaries by 10
percent, but only upon the condition that other unions do the same. So
far the silence has been deafening. The refusal of suppliers to give the
airline better deals than they give their other customers has poured
salt into United's wounds. 

And there is US Airways. Despite its bankruptcy protection filing last
August, its hundreds of layoffs and scores of flights being canceled,
the company estimates it will have to cut an additional $300 million in
operations costs, and many fear that their days are numbered. This is,
however, a Chapter 11 filing, and so we wait patiently for the
organization to begin. Putting a member of the International Association
of Machinists on the board of directors hardly counts. 

How might the industry be reorganized? We have a few suggestions: Fight
the unions and staff associations. Offer a fair wage and benefits
comparable to other industries. Restore a sensible pricing structure to
make flying a feasible alternative for middle class travelers. Rework
the advertising campaign and create a market that makes us want to be
there. 

If all else fails, consider what the Wright brothers would do to
reorganize the industry. They avoided both the government and the
corporate mind-set and simply made a successful take-off and landing
with a short trip to their destination. 

That's all we want, really.

Dateline D.C. is written by a Washington-based British journalist and
political observer.


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