Top pay for baggage handlers is $17 an hour - exactly what it was in 1994, without adjustment for inflation. Starting pay is a little more than half that, a rate that has made it harder to attract and keep people.
As a result, the airline has a workforce split between the remaining veterans and much younger, less-experienced employees - many of whom hire on mainly for the job's big perk: free air travel.
While much of the work is grunt labor, some of it is demanding and precise. It is ramp workers who marshal the 40-ton planes into the gates and drive the push-tugs that nudge jets out for takeoff.
Many employees work hard, but others are cynical and unmotivated - and the negative attitude can be catching.
"You have kids that come in for two weeks and are working perfectly well," one employee said. "Then they look around and say: 'Nobody else is working. Why should I? ' "
A man who trained for the ramp at US Airways said he had given up any thought of taking the job after one US Airways veteran told him: "If you do 500 bags and I do two, the airline won't care. "
Workers at rival Southwest Airlines say they see this sour attitude when they spot US Airways luggage that has tumbled out of carts. When the Southwest employees try to hand over the luggage to their competitor, they say, some US Airways workers simply won't take it.
"We get that a lot: 'I don't want it,' " said one Southwest worker, supervisor Michael Amstberg.
There is a racial aspect to it all, too.
While most US Airways veterans are white, many recent hires are African American. Often, the two groups hang out in different break rooms. Some white workers won't help pay for DirecTV in one break room, complaining that the set is always tuned to BET.
"The issues are generational, but they manifest themselves racially," a veteran said. "It's pretty ugly. "
To lure a better workforce, US Airways bumped up its wages in Philadelphia, hiking starting pay from $7.17 to $9.59 an hour.
It did so after the airline's infamous baggage meltdown in Philadelphia during the 2004 holiday season. This generated the highest rate of monthly baggage complaints for any major airline in the last five years, an Inquirer analysis of federal data shows.
In the interview last week, chief executive Parker said that the airline was paying "market rate" for labor - and that he didn't think the pay level was a reason for the baggage problems.
"It's a different world now," he said. "We're not going to have a workforce with 20 years of experience on the ramp. Indeed, we shouldn't."
Despite many requests for comment, none of the local leaders with the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers, the bag handlers' union, would talk about luggage issues.
Joe Tiberi, a national spokesman for the union, said pay remained too low to draw a reliable workforce.
"They don't know who they will be working with tomorrow," Tiberi said. "People come in, they train, they work for a while, and they just stop showing up. "
Worn-out tugs, too few carts
|
|
|
|
|
|
NEWS
Philly.com Promotions
