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[[image - photograph]]
[[caption]] Pilots and Home Office representatives discuss an agreement [[/caption]]

Decision 83 was fine as far as it went. But it went only as far as putting a minimum, a floor, under pilot pay. It left negotiated improvements up to the pilots. Notably lacking before pilot standards would be raised were statutes to do the job.

As a result, ALPA's activities during this time were concentrated largely on obtaining federal labor statutes upon which to negotiate agreements.

In 1936 Title II of the Railway Labor Act was enacted, putting the air lines under the Railway Labor Act. Despite this, from 1934 to 1938, there was not much progression in pilot pay. It remained just about at the bare minimum produced by Decision 83. 

In 1938, the Civil Aeronautics Act, which made compliance with Title II of the Railway Labor Act a mandatory provision for carriers holding their certificates of convenience and necessity, gave ALPA the much-needed statutes to negotiate their agreements.

Initial Negotiating Period...

The first formal agreement was signed with American Air Lines May 15, 1939. In actuality it incorporated the rates in existence as the result of Decision 83, strengthened by the introduction of stipulations governing certain rules and working conditions, and bound together to form a bilateral agreement. Agreements were subsequently signed with the remaining scheduled carriers, Pan American Airways excepted, within a few months. The first PAA agreement was not signed until 1945. Some increases were negotiated into the agreements during this period. 

Minimum pay as established in Decision 83 was the rule in most contracts for many years. From 1941 to 1945, the war effort was paramount. Pilot work standards maintained more or less the status quo. The post-war period from 1946 to 1950 was devoted mainly to bringing agreements up to date throughout the industry.

Post War Era...

The end of the war brought an influx of the larger, faster and more productive equipment. But the new productivity of the pilots was not reflected in increased pay. The carriers stalled, hewed to the line of old rates, tried mightily to throw negotiations on an industry-wide basis. A 21-day strike on TWA in 1946 brought about appointment of a presidential fact-finding Board which reaffirmed the concept of individual bargaining and, to a degree, recognized rates of compensation patterned on productivity. Implementing these rates, however, was a time-consuming task. Negotiations bogged down. Agreements lapsed. Some took up two years before renewal. In 1946 average pilot pay, industry-wide, was still at Decision 83 levels with minor improvements for copilots. 

Completion of these agreements was reflected noticeably in compensation averages: for the first time, pilots were beginning to share in the gains from increased productivity. 

Current Era...

Since 1951 and until the present, prompt negotiation of agreements upon expiration, plus reasonably but steadily-bargained increases, has results in substantial, year by year increases. Pilots, in turn, by their ever-improving "on-schedule" performance, by the safety record compiled through their skill, and by their increases productivity have more than justified the upward trend by enabling the industry to realize every possible benefit of technological advancement. 

This last period in the history of ALPA agreements has also been extremely noteworthy for the refinements introduced and negotiated into most agreements-the so-called "fringe benefit" sections, job protections clauses, and provisions applying to working conditions generally. Broadly, these improvements are:

- Flight time computation on a scheduled or actual, whichever is greater, basis as opposed strictly to scheduled time.
- Common base pay. 
- Increment-type pay for copilots.
- Minimum monthly guarantees, approximately 60 hours for domestic pilots, 70 hours for international pilots.
- Extensions of full paid sick leaves and vacations, deadhead payments, expense allowances, training pay, layover and stand-by compensation, moving expense, etc.
- Advancements in incorporating protective on-duty provisions in pilots' working conditions.
- Strengthening of the principle of full retroactivity. 
- Bid rights for copilots.
- Payment for all miles flown at a constant of increasing rate as contrasted to Decision 83.
- Provisions for arbitration of deadlocked grievances before the System Adjustment Board.

Thus the contrast between both the direct and indirect benefits enjoyed by today's pilots over that of 20 years ago is large.

A final indication of progress: ALPA's first agreement was eight years in the making, a comparatively basic document. As late as 1948 some agreements were more than two years in negotiations. Today, ALPA has 39 agreements, with both trunk and local service carriers. These complex documents are negotiated at a rate of more than one a week. In 1953 alone over 80 agreements, supplemental agreements, Letters of Agreement, Amendments, and Interchange Agreements were negotiated.

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