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of the current pay, at best, and might frequently be 10 or 12 percent. These plans obviously do not give the pilot much more sense of security than he would have if there were no plan.

The Proposal of the Air Line Pilots Association

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The A.L.P.A proposes to adapt the Railroad Retirement Act to provide a retirement system for air line pilots. In place of the $300 maximum creditable monthly salaries under the Railroad Retirement System, the A.L.P.A. would fix the ceiling for air line pilots at $1000; and in place of the $50 under the Railroad Act, the A.L.P.A. would fix a minimum of $200. Retirement for occupational disability would be 10 years for the air line pilots system as against 20 for the railroads, and, for permanent and total disability, 5 years instead of 10. For survivor purposes, the creditable monthly pay is fixed at a maximum of $750 rather than $250 set by the railroad and social security systems.

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The proposed air line pilot system would not in any way disturb the benefits now payable to pilots under Title II of the Social Security Act, and all the taxes payable by the pilots and the air line employers would continue without change. When the pilot himself draws an annuity under Title II of the Social Security Act, beginning at 65, the amount of such annuity would be subtracted from his annuity, under the air line pilot system.

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A.L.P.A. proposes that the air line pilots retirement system be administered by the Railroad Retirement Board. There would be a retirement fund separate and distinct form the Railroad Retirement account. The extra administration costs of the Railroad Retirement Board would be included in the tax rate paid by pilots and their employers.

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The A.L.P.A. proposal would cover only the air line pilots. Other air line employees, even the other members of flight crews, do not have the rigid physical standards and, therefore, do not face the same retirement problem as pilots. If an effort were made to draft a single bill providing retirement benefits for all air line employees, there would either have to be two systems and two rates of contributions in the same bill or the other air line employees would contribute toward the cost of a pilots' system. They would, of course, object to that. But the bill to provide for two systems would almost surely find a wide variety of opinion between air line employees other than pilots, as to what the second system should provide. While the pilots