One day after American Airlines mechanics staged a protest against executive stock bonuses at the airline, the flight attendants have launched their own salvo on-line. In a YouTube video members of the Association of Professional Flight Attendants complain about the stock options scheduled to be paid out to execs Wednesday, the same day the airline announced a quarterly net loss of more than $375 million dollars.
Tuesday's protest at the company's headquarters in Fort Worth featured mechanics and ground workers waving mock bonus checks, tearing them up, and even burning them. The flight attendants union seems to be taking a more low key approach in protesting the bonuses this year because the union has set May 1st as a target date for reaching a new contract agreement. Negotiations continued Wednesday with the help of a federal mediator.
Management at American's parent company, AMR, maintains the stock options are part of the compensation package needed to retain top employees. And this year the value of those stock awards is down, because the company's stock price is down.