American Airlines Bankruptcy - Your Perspective (Clint: 2015, calculator, high income)

[Johnhw2]

Originally Posted by OpenD

Why? Because all the other legacy carriers have broken their promises to their older employees.

I think too many people engaged in this debate forget that we are talking about people's lives. I have a good friend who recently retired from a long career at AA, and she is terrified. She was a flight attendant, originally recruited because she was also a cardiac nurse, so she was very much desired to be attendant on long trans-Atlantic flights. And she was enterprising, learning to be a Purser as well as handling her other duties.

She didn't retire because she wanted to, but simply because after so many years bumping those heavy service carts around in mid-air her ankles gave out. Most people don't realize how physical the job is.

She's the dearest person in the world, charming and generous and lovely. You WISH she would be YOUR flight attendant.

And now, worn out and retired, the three things she counted on in her declining years, and worked so hard to achieve... pension, health insurance, and travel benefits... all are under attack as "too expensive."

If it's simply "too expensive" to fulfill our promises to our senior citizens, who are already "all in" to the plans they subscribed to, whether corporate or societal, then we are simply asking for our own futures to be terminated, with prejudice, by an uncaring generation to follow.

Dont get me started, our gov does this all the time. We thought we were a rich country now we are deep in debt. Broken promises abound and impact us all. Does that make it right? No. Does that mean its going to continue to happen? Yes. We live beyond our means and this is the consequences, people cant afford the air fare it takes to make good on these promises and translate that to any and every other product or service.

[JimBaker488]

I realize that AMRs Chapter 11 reorg is in the early stages but what is the thinking on how the process is moving along, or is it still way too early to give it a grade ?

[Pete53FR]

The Unions and Management are all so greedy it makes you wonder. I took a Mexican Vacation a couple of years ago and it was a trip from hell with flights delayed for hours both ways. Meanwhile the Mexican Airlines left on time.

[Cowboys fan in Houston]

Originally Posted by JimBaker488

I realize that AMRs Chapter 11 reorg is in the early stages but what is the thinking on how the process is moving along, or is it still way too early to give it a grade ?

I think it is. They have 18 months to get their stuff together. Its going to be a while before we know how this truly goes for them.

[padcrasher]

Originally Posted by Johnhw2

Dont get me started, our gov does this all the time. We thought we were a rich country now we are deep in debt. Broken promises abound and impact us all. Does that make it right? No. Does that mean its going to continue to happen? Yes. We live beyond our means and this is the consequences, people cant afford the air fare it takes to make good on these promises and translate that to any and every other product or service.

No. We didn't "live beyond our means". Our effective tax rates are some of the lowest in the Western World. What we did was lowered taxes on the ultra wealthy and started needless Trillion dollar wars. Wealthy elites in this country have bought and paid for Congress and the MSM. They have convinced most ignorant lazy Americans we are "living beyond our means", when in actuality, white American males don't have the brains or cojones to stand up for themselves. Moderate increases in taxation of the wealthy and moderate cuts to defense would basically solve the budget deficit.

learn for yourself http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2...s-graphic.html

[skids929]

Originally Posted by padcrasher

No. We didn't "live beyond our means". Our effective tax rates are some of the lowest in the Western World. What we did was lowered taxes on the ultra wealthy and started needless Trillion dollar wars. Wealthy elites in this country have bought and paid for Congress and the MSM. They have convinced most ignorant lazy Americans we are "living beyond our means", when in actuality, white American males don't have the brains or cojones to stand up for themselves. Moderate increases in taxation of the wealthy and moderate cuts to defense would basically solve the budget deficit.

Surprisingly I agree with some of what you said here on Defense spend and taxing effectively Where your argument falls on it's face is blaming wealthy elites for buying Politicians. They're just playing by the rules our Poitical system has set up, it's really a function of the political lobby in America, which I believe should be eliminated and we should rely solely on the popular vote.

Good luck getting rid of that.

[padcrasher]

Originally Posted by skids929

Surprisingly I agree with some of what you said here on Defense spend and taxing effectively Where your argument falls on it's face is blaming wealthy elites for buying Politicians. They're just playing by the rules our Poitical system has set up, it's really a function of the political lobby in America, which I believe should be eliminated and we should rely solely on the popular vote.

Good luck getting rid of that.

Well lobbyists are legal, and so are unlimited donations on behalf of corporations to political PACs now thanks to the right wing members of SCOTUS. So I agree the rich are mainly just playing by the rules.
My beef is with the shrinking middle class which will not stand up for itself and change the rules.

[skids929]

Originally Posted by padcrasher

Well lobbyists are legal, and so are unlimited donations on behalf of corporations to political PACs now thanks to the right wing members of SCOTUS. So I agree the rich are mainly just playing by the rules.
My beef is with the shrinking middle class which will not stand up for itself and change the rules.

Popular vote and no lobbying would reflect the middle class more accurately.

[Johnhw2]

Originally Posted by padcrasher

No. We didn't "live beyond our means". Our effective tax rates are some of the lowest in the Western World. What we did was lowered taxes on the ultra wealthy and started needless Trillion dollar wars. Wealthy elites in this country have bought and paid for Congress and the MSM. They have convinced most ignorant lazy Americans we are "living beyond our means", when in actuality, white American males don't have the brains or cojones to stand up for themselves. Moderate increases in taxation of the wealthy and moderate cuts to defense would basically solve the budget deficit.

learn for yourself Budget Puzzle: You Fix the Budget - Interactive Feature - NYTimes.com

Our corporate tax rates are out of line with countries we compete with for jobs. Also the US taxes world wide corporate income not just US as other civilized countries do. Now we are going to eliminate things policians lie and call loopholes for big oils? They are allowed to deduct these same cash costs to produce income in over countries but not here? We cant tax corporations more than others and find the path to good middle class jobs. The NYT link is childish and doesnt address the tax rate of corporations. Ever heard of the economist, not a biased rag like the NYT. Tax the wealthy all you want, they have the resources to move to Monoco or some place out of the US. If you think we didnt live beyond our means in mass how did the real estate bubble occur with large numbers of foreclosures? Oh I know the party line...its the bankers who made every one do it? If people cant tel how much home they can afford no wonder we dont have enough engineers or math majors to manufacture things.

[JimBaker488]

Originally Posted by padcrasher

Moderate increases in taxation of the wealthy and moderate cuts to defense would basically solve the budget deficit.

learn for yourself Budget Puzzle: You Fix the Budget - Interactive Feature - NYTimes.com

Substantially increasing income taxes on the wealthy would pretty much represent no more than a drop in the bucket towards what needs to be done to close the deficit - those tax increases would be measured in the billions while deficits these days are being measured in the trillions.
As a veteran, I stand at the head of the line in advocating cuts, massive cuts, in military spending, but that won't be enough either. We also need to make substantial changes to our Social Security and Medicare programs to rein in control of their expenditures along with next and newest out-of-control trillion dollar entitlement program known as Obama-care. In other words, everybody has got to pitch in and make sacrifices.