Feeds: 
symbol identifies content for paid subscribers only.
SUPER AWESOME: SULLY IS A LABOR ACTIVIST!
Miracle on the Hudson pilot Chesley "Sully" Sullenberger will attend Obama's first SOTU speech tonight as a guest of Nancy Pelosi. No big surprise there. What's really cool is that Sully stuck his neck out for labor rights today when he testified in front of Congress. The AP reports:
[Sully] told the House aviation subcommittee that his pay has been cut 40 percent in recent years and his pension has been terminated and replaced with a promise "worth pennies on the dollar" from the federally created Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp. These cuts followed a wave of airline bankruptcies after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks compounded by the current recession, he said.The reduced compensation has placed "pilots and their families in an untenable financial situation," Sullenberger said. "I do not know a single, professional airline pilot who wants his or her children to follow in their footsteps."
Update: Sully also stood up for the labor rights of crew members in his testimony.
--Dana Goldstein
COMMENTS (11)
Considering that pay for experienced captains is easily over $100,000/year, I'm not sure they make the greatest poster boys for Labor.
Posted by: Brien Jackson | February 24, 2009 5:33 PM
Not to get into some blog war, but Sully would make a great poster boy for labor, salary aside. Just ask anyone on that plane( or the country for that matter). Who sponsors( and/or advocates) the training he has gone through? I would have been very surprised if he made under 100k. I don't think i'm alone in that assumtion.
Posted by: red | February 24, 2009 5:41 PM
Nobody in America is going to be shocked by a low six figures salary for a job with that kind of responsibility, after hearing so much about the $millions taken home by incompetent financial executives.
Posted by: Ben Rosengart | February 24, 2009 5:57 PM
" I would have been very surprised if he made under 100k. I don't think i'm alone in that assumtion."
Oh absolutely. I'm not faultng the guys for making that, there aren't very many people who can fly 747's in the world. But I don't think I'd be rushing to hold up a guy who makes an experienced pilot's salary and says his family in feeling a pinch even though he's making above the national median income as a populist Labor hero. I don't think that's going to go over all that well.
Posted by: Brien Jackson | February 24, 2009 6:00 PM
Granted, he's not joe the capt, and probably makes twice as much as the flt. attendants, but 100k with kids is middle class.
"his pay has been cut 40 percent in recent years and his pension has been terminated and replaced with a promise "worth pennies on the dollar" from the federally created Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp."
If this can happen to a technically proficient( dare I say necessary,and un-out-sourcable) union member( not to mention air-traffic controllers in the 80's)it can( and is)happening to the UAW, SEIU, ETC..etc...Union members aren't all blue-collar and they don't all reside in Appalachia.
Posted by: red | February 24, 2009 6:21 PM
I don't suppose Sully might want to run for Congress? Where does he live?
Posted by: Omar | February 24, 2009 7:17 PM
Bay Area, but from a different district than Pelosi.
Posted by: Jenn | February 24, 2009 7:24 PM
Pilots are union members. A pay cut and pension termination for them is an assault against YOU. If they can get away with it for some of the most skilled workers in the country, what can other workers expect?
Posted by: NaidaG | February 24, 2009 9:29 PM
I remember Jane Hamsher of Firedoglake talking about Sullenberger's labor activism the day he became famous. The guy isn't just a great pilot, he's been a fighter for a long time for better conditions for his fellow workers.
Posted by: Joe Buck | February 24, 2009 11:51 PM
I am thrilled that Capt. Sullenberger is speaking out for the union workers. He and that crew had decades of experience and I'd want that on any flight I was on. Compare that to the relative inexperience on the Buffalo crash plane (I think the co-pilot was 24).
Sully was scheduled to teach air safety at Berkeley this year. I imagine that is postponed but will be a full class when he does teach.
He lives East of SF in Danville, a pretty conservative exurb. Would love to see him run for congress!!
Posted by: BerkeleyMom | February 25, 2009 12:50 AM
Brien,
Remember all the cuts that hit pilots and their retirement apply to stewardesses, ground crew, and everyone else who works for the airlines as well
Posted by: eric k | February 25, 2009 2:41 AM