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Pilots to bid for AMR?
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October 19, 1999: 6:28 a.m. ET
Union may seek controlling stake in American Airlines' parent company
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NEW YORK (CNNfn) - The union representing American Airlines' pilots is studying whether it may be able to buy a controlling stake in the airline's parent company, AMR Corp., the Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday.
The union is feuding with management at the nation's No. 2 airline and any bid by the pilots would face major hurdles, though employee ownership in the airline business is not unprecedented, the newspaper said.
Union members in three cities that are hubs for American -- Los Angeles, Dallas and Miami -- have approved forming an Employee Stock Ownership Plan committee. Union members at those three bases took leadership roles in a February sickout that crippled services at American. The board of the Allied Pilots Association, which represents about 9,000 pilots at the airline, will review possibilities next week, according to the report.
In 1994, machinists, pilots and non-union workers at UAL Corp. (UAL), the parent of United Airlines, traded the equivalent of $4.9 billion in pay and benefits for a 55 percent stake in the company. The cost of buying half of AMR would be at least $5 billion, the newspaper said.
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