American Airlines Flight Attendants Vote to Authorize a Strike, Although a Walkout Still Unlikely
An American Airlines plane at LaGuardia Airport's Terminal B, Tuesday, Nov. 22, 2022, in New York. Travel experts say the ability of many people to work remotely is letting them take off early for Thanksgiving or return home later. Crowds are expected to rival those of 2019, the last Thanksgiving before the pandemic. (AP Photo/Julia Nikhinson)
FORT WORTH, Texas (AP) — Flight attendants at American Airlines voted overwhelmingly to authorize union leaders to call for a strike, a move designed to put pressure on the carrier during negotiations over pay raises.
The Association of Professional Flight Attendants said Wednesday that more than 99% of members who voted recently favored giving the union power to call a strike. The union backed up the vote with picketing at several airports.
Union President Julie Hedrick said the vote tells company management that flight attendants, who have not received raises since 2019, are “fired up." American executives, she said, “ignore this strike vote at their peril.”
American said, “We’re proud of the progress we’ve made in negotiations with the APFA, and we look forward to reaching an agreement that provides our flight attendants with real and meaningful value. We understand that a strike authorization vote is one of the important ways flight attendants express their desire to get a deal done.”
The vote does not mean that a strike is imminent or even likely. Federal law makes it difficult for airline unions to conduct legal strikes — they need a decision from federal mediators that further negotiations would be pointless, which rarely happens. The president and Congress can also get involved to delay or block a strike.
Earlier this month, American's pilots ratified a contract that will raise average pay more than 40% over four years. Flight attendants are not expected to reap that kind of increase, as they have less leverage than pilots, who are in short supply.
Other airline unions are also pushing for new contracts. Pilots at Southwest Airlines and flight attendants at United Airlines plan to picket at airports Thursday.
An independent watchdog within the IRS reports that while taxpayer services have vastly improved, the agency is still too slow to resolve identity theft cases. And National Taxpayer Advocate Erin Collins says those delays are “unconscionable.” Erin M. Collins said in the report released Wednesday that overall the 2024 filing season went smoothly, though IRS delays in resolving identity theft victim assistance cases are worsening. It took nearly 19 months to resolve self-reported identity theft cases as of January, and Wednesday's report states that now it takes 22 months to resolve these cases.
Amazon.com Inc. surpassed $2 trillion in market value for the first time in afternoon trading on Wednesday. The push higher for Amazon’s stock market valuation comes a little more than a week after Nvidia hit $3 trillion and briefly became the most valuable company on Wall Street. Nvidia’s chips are used to power many AI application and its valuation has soared as a result. Amazon has also been making big investments in AI as global interest has grown in the technology. Most of the company’s focus has been on business-focused products.
