Gold-Plated Grounding

Along its 17,860-mile system from Chicago to Honolulu, Continental Airlines has attracted considerable attention--and some charges of sexism --with its "We really move our tail for you" advertising campaign. At 12:01 a.m. Oct. 23, Continental's tail stopped moving. Its 47 Boeing 727s and 16 DC-10s were grounded by a strike for the first time in the 42-year history of the Los Angeles-based airline. The cause-some of the most gold-plated demands ever made by a labor union.

The walkout, by 1,050 pilots and other cockpit personnel after nearly 16 months of negotiations, caught most of the airline's employees by surprise It was clear that the pilots underestimated the gravity of a signal sent out by Robert Six, 69, Continental's tough chief executive, who is regarded as the last of the pioneer airline bosses in the mold of Juan Trippe (Pan Am) and Eddie Rickenbacker (Eastern). In a memorandum to all employees, Six warned, "I will not mortgage Continental's future by surrendering to demands which will ensure the failure of this company."

More Cash. The pilots initially had put on the table 486 proposals that the company estimated would cost $134 million--or more money than Continental has earned in profit since it began flying. Among the demands: free vasectomies, and salaries above $100,000 a year for senior captains of Continental's jumbo jets. To help make up for small raises parceled out during the Nixon wage-price freeze, Continental offered to increase pilots' pay by 10% immediately, then bargain on how much more they would get. The pilots dismissed that idea as an attempt to buy them off and also rejected a Continental offer to submit the dispute to binding arbitration.

The company and the Air Line Pilots Association have since pared the list of demands to around 150. Money is no longer a major stumbling block. The company has offered a 35% hike over three years, retroactive to Nov. 1, 1975 It would raise the pay of senior captains flying Continental's Boeing 727s from $47,364 to $66,600 a year, plus more than $14,000 in benefits; salaries of senior DC-10 captains would go from $58,248 to $79,200, plus more than $20,000 in benefits. The key problem is that the pilots also want to reduce the amount of time they are required to be on duty, especially between midnight and dawn; they also seek longer layovers between flights.

Six seems determined to show the pilots that "they underestimated us." It will be a walkout without much public sympathy; even in the eyes of some less well-paid Continental employees, the pilots already seem well off. Many pilots own outside businesses (ski resorts, cattle ranches, law practices) and, says Six, there is a feeling that "they are trying to get more free time to devote to those businesses." Concedes Pilot Dick Engle:"Because of the level of salaries, it is pretty hard to persuade people to sympathize with our point of view."

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