I have been sitting in limbo since August 3rd.

I accepted a contract offer to be in the flight sim program in STL and was supposed to start on 8/3. Then this whole freeze and voting for SPEEA hit and it’s left me in a weird spot. I’ve received several offers to work in the defense industry for different capacities but overall my goal was Boeing.

I’m not concerned about being employed immediately as I’m a disabled vet and created a great situation for my family but I’m very disappointed that I haven’t been able to start my work with Boeing due to my goal of being employed by Boeing is finally attainable. I’ve been with LM and Raytheon as a contractor and they had me in the door on my start date despite what was going on and I know it’s a different company blah bleh bloo but this stings a bit as I know there’s a huge disconnect between the union and corporate for each company respectfully.

My contract rep has told me that they expect to be over this by next week but I am fearful they will delete the req due to everything going on or something crazy.

What is the projection for this hiring freeze to be over? I don’t expect a straight up answer but insight from those who are currently in STL or know could you help ease my mind.

16,072 Authorized, tellers said unable to see tech vs. prof vote

Update 18-Aug Tuesday: 6-7%

• 17-Aug — 56%
• 16-Aug — 54%
• 15-Aug — 50%
• 14-Aug - 46%
• 13-Aug — 20%
• 13-Aug — 0% (12pm vote start)

Source: Teller updates on chats

I have a domestic business trip coming up but when booking flights, the cheaper flights are 1 or 2 stops. I really prefer doing nonstop flights because I'm not trying to spend 10hours for traveling and getting to hotel when there's shorter 3hr direct flights available. When I try to book direct flights, it flags saying that the flight is not the cheapest fare and asks for reasoning. Am I not allowed to do direct flights? In my situation, travel day on Monday, work on site Tues to Thurs, and then travel day Friday. Is it reasonable for Boeing to have you spend 10 hours of your day for travel for them save some cash?

Anyone else think that SOJT is just another exercise in pencil whipping?
r/FAA

What does it mean to “Authorize the negotiation team to call a strike”

For the length of the last SPEEA contract, wage pools were fixed at ~3% a year. On its own, that’s just a number. But the salary ranges used to judge whether that number was adequate stayed frozen the entire time.

A stale range doesn’t just fail to catch up, it actively hides how far behind a small raise really is, because there’s nothing current to measure it against other than outside job offers.

That’s not one bad year. That’s years compounding, quietly, while the range said everything looked fine.

Then, before this contract year, the ranges moved all at once. That’s the real number finally showing up. And the fix offered for years of that gap is a single 3% bump, sized for one year, applied to a problem that took years to build.

This isn’t the inflation argument. This is simpler. Boeing’s own updated numbers confirmed people were underpaid the whole time. The fix should be sized to match what actually broke. It isn’t.

One clean, one-time adjustment sized to match the actual gap the range update revealed, not a normal 3% raise, a real catch-up number. Not four years of backpay, just one honest correction that closes the real distance instead of pretending a standard raise already did it.

No need for fancy charts and graphs to know this contract needs a better adjustment on the GWI that is accurate.

I know this is just speculation, but over the last week I had to stay in hotels while we had the wood floors redone and every hotel between Everett and Lynnwood was booked. I was forced to spend half the week at the Hilton in Lynnwood and the other at the Marriott in lynnwood as none could put me up for the entire week. The one thing both had in common were they were filled with brown badge engineers in town for training, and how they hopped the strike would last for a long time.

It looks like Boeing is getting ready for a long strike and seems to have remembered the pain the last speea strike caused the company in the 90's.

.

Before I start I would like to disclose I am not a bot however that's exactly what I would say if I was a bot.

For all those gung ho about a strike, have you guys analyzed the potential risks? Sure we could get more but at what cost?

It's a game of chicken and reality needs to be taken into consideration. If you haven't been living under a rock, you should be aware of the economic conditions right now and how it affects us indirectly and directly. Should be aware of the events around the world and risks.

Everybody compares the IAM contract and their strike but keep in mind. Two years ago is not the same as today. One year ago is not the same as today. Hell not even a few months ago is not the same as today. We are living in different and very turbulent times.

IAM initial offer was also substantially worst than our initial offer and they had to go on strike for almost two months to get something better. Lastly there was a layoff and furlough and you can argue the layoff was going to happen anyway, you don't know that for sure. Maybe, maybe not but the point stands. A strike will bleed the company and when a company bleeds, cost cutting follows. Unfortunately in the world we live in, layoffs are a universal tool for cutting cost and they are often not correlated with actual headcount needs. A company will risk overstressing current workforce, doing more with less and cutting to the bone until they start using other tools.

What other tools they have to raise money? Stock dilution and borrowing which will cause the stock to fall and are highly unpopular. Layoffs and furloughs are one of the first things they consider if need comes up. That's the unfortunate reality.

For obvious reasons you can't compare the IAM raise with SPEAA raise. We are in different professions. The salary stack up is widely different and many other reasons I won't go into here. However lets do some comparison for the sake of argument.

Lets look at the math and taking into account the 3%, 6%, 5%, 5%, 5% numbers only. That's slightly above 26% compounded and ignoring the extra which not everyone might get. If you put in the extras the numbers better. IAM got 43% compounded. That's 17% difference. I doubt even with a strike we get anywhere close to that figure but let's assume we get 10% more which would be very good.

How many months of strike will that take? 1? 2? Maybe a few weeks? What if it leads to a layoff?

Is it worth the risk?

R1s and R2s don't have to worry (there will still be an impact such as absorbing the work of R3s) but a layoff would decimate the R3s. For intern a full time position would almost definitely be eliminated and those newly hired would be among the tip of the spear to go. A strike can also cause next year's bonus to be low.

In normal times you might argue the risk is worth it but we are living in far from normal times. Companies are laying people off left and right. Tech sector is being decimated. Finding a good job right now is very difficult and many will spend months and months until they get something which can have even less benefits overall. Check out the layoff boards and see for yourself. It's not a pretty picture out there. Many are struggling.

You might think layoffs are impossible because we need people. We do need people but since when did that stop companies from laying off? When it comes to raising money and keeping the stock up (even temporarily), employees are as expandable as a wet napkin. So be aware of the risk.

Also be aware that not everyone is at the same risk level and people should analyze their risks accordingly and make decisions that are ultimately best for themselves. People shouldn't put themselves on fire to keep others warm.

This doesn't take into account eliminating positions and moving them elsewhere. Not every position is movable but many are. Ultimately everyone will be hurt long-term by a reduced footprint even if you are not impacted initially.

Make an informed decision that you feel good about and don't let social media gaslight you.

I will leave you with the quote "the devil you know is always better than the devil you don't know".

• Yes
• No
• Abstain

Actual voting is tomorrow Thursday, Aug. 13

Here we go!

Gee, their new wage modeler says someone who meets expectations will be receiving 7/5.5/5.5/5.5% raises starting next year. And if you get a low rating you'll still receive 3% every year. What a load of BS.

To preface, I fully respect your right to vote whichever way. But if you’re undecided, here’s why it may be in your interest to wait.

SPEEA staff have repeatedly said, the worst outcome we can get as a union is a weak No. As the voting period starts tomorrow, talk to your coworkers in the coming weeks, see what the general consensus seems to be.

If you are undecided or are slightly leaning yes, but the offer is looking unlikely to prevail here, a resounding no vote will give our Negotiators a better, unified voice at the table. Last thing we want is a 50% + 1 “No” where Boeing can just tell us to pound sand and send us a same or worse counter offer.

Again, I am not bashing Yes voters, it is up to you to decide if this first offer is good or not good enough. However, if you’re unsure, talk to folks around you, make sure we avoid a “weak No”!

I'm a SPEEA Prof, two decades at Boeing. I've watched contracts get voted down and watched what came after. Sometimes it was worth it. Sometimes we burned months and ended up with the same deal minus the sweeteners. So I took the time to actually read this one, including the red-line CBA, run my own numbers, and pressure-test the objections I'm seeing online.

Here's what I keep hearing, and what I think:

"You never accept the first offer!"

This one comes up every single time, so let me address it head-on.

The logic behind "never accept a first offer" assumes the other side is lowballing. That they're holding back and will give more if you push. That makes sense when you're buying a car. It doesn't automatically apply here.

This isn't Boeing's opening gambit. SPEEA and Boeing have been at the table for months. What's in front of us is the product of actual bargaining between two parties. SPEEA's negotiating team agreed to bring this to a vote. They didn't have to. If it were garbage, they'd still be at the table. You can disagree with their judgment, but calling this a "first offer" misrepresents what happened before it reached us.

The early incentives create a real cost to waiting. The $32,678 in estimated average value per person (the retroactive 3% GWI compounded over the contract, the 2025 incentive bump, the 2026 target increase) explicitly disappears after August 22. Boeing stated they'll redirect that money to a contingency plan. So the question isn't "can we get more?" It's "can we get enough more to offset losing $32K per person right now?" That's a math problem, not a philosophy problem.

Think about history. The IAM machinists in 2024 rejected multiple offers, struck for weeks, and got a final deal. Was it dramatically better? Debatable. And it came at the cost of lost wages during the strike, months of uncertainty, and burned goodwill. SPEEA doesn't have the same strike leverage. Our work doesn't stop a production line in the same visible way. Our leverage is talent retention and institutional knowledge, which is real, but plays out over years, not weeks on a picket line.

And the substance matters: 28.5% in total wage funds with the opportunity for 31.9% compounded growth, the highest wage pools in over 40 years, RSUs, a pension increase, a new HRA, three additional paid days off. At some point the offer has to be evaluated on its merits, not on a bumper sticker. If "never accept the first offer" is a principle, what's the number that would be acceptable? Because I'm not sure what realistic outcome justifies gambling $32K to find out.

"The wage pools aren't guaranteed. It all goes through ACR and your manager decides."

The 3% GWI is guaranteed for everyone. Retroactive to February. The pools after that (7.5%, 6%, 6%, 6% including performance and promotional funds) are performance-based through ACR, same as every contract we've ever had. But here's what's different this time, and I confirmed it in the red-line contract language (Article 11.1(b)(1)):

The salary adjustment fund is now split into two components. First: a minimum salary increase for every eligible employee, determined by CPI-W (the year-over-year change in the Consumer Price Index for Urban Wage Earners, averaged over Q3), capped at 3%. Second: the remainder of the pool distributed based on individual performance through ACR. If CPI-W is flat or negative in a given year, the minimum is 0% and the entire pool goes to performance-based distribution.

That means in any year where inflation is running positive (which it has been consistently), every employee gets at least that CPI-W percentage as a guaranteed salary increase before performance differentiation kicks in. With current CPI-W above 2%, that's a meaningful minimum in practice. The mechanism itself, a guaranteed inflation-linked component within the pool separate from performance, didn't exist in the previous contract. The old contract had a flat 3% pool distributed entirely at management discretion with no structural minimum for any individual.

If your concern is "my manager might screw me on the performance portion," the answer is the revised PM process has no forced distribution, a defined appeal process (up to skill team level), and self-assessments and peer evaluations are voluntary. No one can use them against you. That's all new.

"40 RSUs is a joke compared to what non-union gets."

Non-union employees don't get guaranteed wage pools. They don't get a pension. They don't get the same layoff protections. The RSUs are additive. They don't replace anything in our existing comp structure. They don't change your base salary, incentive eligibility, or retirement calculations. And if you're 55+ with 10 years of service when you retire, they vest immediately. For me, that means I don't have to time my retirement around a vesting schedule. The comparison to non-union RSU grants is apples to oranges because the total comp structures are fundamentally different.

"The 401(k) change only helps young people."

If you're over 50, your total employer contribution is already 11%. That hasn't changed because it was already at the top. The increase targets people under 40, bringing them from 9% to 10% total. Over 7,800 people benefit. If the complaint is "I didn't get more," the answer is you were already getting the most. The structure didn't get worse for anyone.

"Four-year contract is too long. What if inflation spikes?"

The contract has a defined COLA mechanism in Article 11.1(c) tied to CPI-W with threshold percentages at 12%, 22%, 32%, and 42% cumulative from the 2025 base period. If inflation exceeds those thresholds, additional Cost of Living Adjustments kick in, calculated as 50% of the BLS Index increase that exceeds the threshold percentage for that year. This is separate from and on top of the salary adjustment funds.

Those thresholds are high. They're designed as protection against extreme inflation scenarios, not as annual raises. Under normal 2-3% annual inflation, they won't trigger. Your real year-to-year inflation protection comes from the CPI-W linked minimum within the salary pool (up to 3% annually). The COLA is the emergency backstop on top of that.

So you have two layers: (1) the CPI-W linked minimum within the salary pool for normal inflation, and (2) additional COLA adjustments for runaway inflation. A shorter contract means back to negotiations sooner, which also means uncertainty, potential work actions, and no guarantee of a better outcome.

"Remote work language is toothless. Managers can still say no."

Before this contract: upper-level mandates banning virtual work existed. After: the old Virtual Office/Telecommuting LOU is struck and replaced with a new LOU on Flexible Work Location and Virtual Work. The new language establishes a defined request process, requires manager approval or denial based on operational requirements, and includes a multi-step challenge process: first-line manager discussion, escalation to Senior Manager, then Senior Manager plus HR plus Union Representative meeting. If the Company doesn't follow the review steps, the union may file a grievance specifically with regard to the process.

Is it a guaranteed right to work from home? No. Is it a structural improvement from "blanket ban" to "defined process with documented challenge rights and a grievance-eligible process failure"? Yes. That's not nothing.

"The early vote deadline is a pressure tactic."

Sure. It's also $32,678 in estimated average value per person. That's the 3% compounded over the contract ($25,442), the retroactive 2025 incentive bump ($4,114), and the 2026 incentive increase ($3,122). Boeing said plainly that these incentives won't be available later. The money goes to funding a contingency plan instead. You can be annoyed by the pressure and still recognize that walking away from $32K to make a point is expensive.

"The IAM got $12K ratification bonuses. We got nothing."

We got something better. We got 3% added to base salary, retroactive to February, compounding for the life of the contract and beyond. The IAM got lump sums. $12K, $6K, whatever the number was. Those are one-time cash. They don't compound. They don't raise your base. They don't increase your pension calculation, your EIP payout, your overtime rate, your 401(k) contributions, or your salary for the next ACR cycle. They're gone the day after they hit your account.

Our 3% is permanent. It raises your base salary, which means every percentage-based calculation for the next four years, and every year after that until you retire, starts from a higher number. Boeing's own fact sheet calculates the compounded value of that 3% over the contract at $25,442 per person on average. That's not a lump sum you spend and forget. That's baked into your compensation structure forever.

We all went to engineering school. We did the math on compound interest, on time-value calculations, on recursive functions. Stop thinking in addition and subtraction. A 3% base increase that compounds over four years of 7.5%, 6%, 6%, 6% pools is worth dramatically more than a flat $12K check that doesn't touch your base rate. The IAM got a signing bonus. We got a permanent raise. Those aren't the same thing.

"The retention change to 80/20 hurts senior people."

I read the redline on this (Article 8.4). The old system was R1/R2/R3 at 38-42% / 38-42% / 18-22%. The new system is R1/R2 at 78-82% / 18-22%. The seniority bump for Profs is now at 20 years: if you're R2 with 20+ years of service, you get adjusted to R1. That's stronger than the old contract where the bump from R3 to R2 was at 20 years and R2 to R1 was at 30 years. Under the new structure, 20 years gets you adjusted straight to R1. For someone at my tenure, that's an improvement.

Also new: designated employees (those flagged as ineligible for priority recall) must now be identified by skill teams, not just individual managers. And the exception provision in 8.5(a)(1) now requires Skill Team oversight and approval. More guardrails than before.

"Purchased services language isn't strong enough."

The contract now requires purchased services in SPEEA skill codes to be released prior to layoffs of SPEEA employees. That's new enforceable language. There's also more rigorous SPEEA oversight built in. Is it a ban? No. But it's a contractual protection where before we had a side letter.

"The pension increase barely matters. $10/month per year of service."

For me at 20 years, that's $200/month more in retirement. Stack it with the new Retiree-Only HRA that matches the amount of your unused sick leave payout into a tax-free account for qualified medical expenses available for 20 years post-retirement, the RSU acceleration at qualifying retirement, and the new access-only retiree medical for post-2007 hires. The retirement package moved meaningfully. It just didn't move in one dramatic line item. It moved across five.

"No real COLA."

Article 11.1(c) defines additional Cost of Living Adjustments separate from the salary pools. The formula: 50% of the percentage increase in CPI-W from the 2025 base period (317.3) that exceeds the threshold percentage for each year (12% for 2027, 22% for 2028, 32% for 2029, 42% for 2030). Those thresholds are high. They're designed as protection against extreme inflation, not as annual raises. Under normal 2-3% inflation, they won't trigger. Your real year-to-year inflation protection comes from the CPI-W linked minimum within the salary pool (up to 3% annually). The COLA is the emergency backstop on top of that. Combined, it's the most inflation protection any SPEEA contract has included.

One more thing. About who negotiated this.

I want to say something about the people on both sides of this table, because I think it matters.

I can personally testify that Ben Nimmergut, David Loffing, Robert Joga, and Doug Ackerman on the Boeing side genuinely care about Boeing employees. These aren't the Jack Welch disciples. They aren't Jim McNerney. They aren't the Delaney era. Those leaders are gone. The people at this table now grew up inside Boeing watching what those previous regimes did to the workforce, to morale, to institutional trust. They understood the destructive nature of that leadership firsthand. They're a different generation.

Same is true on SPEEA's side. Kevin Boyd, Tristan Vogeler, Ben Merritt, Alex Phillips, Andrew Ferguson, and Debi Pennington care about the members. They didn't bring this to a vote because Boeing pressured them into it. They brought it because they believe, after months of bargaining, that this is a deal worth taking. You can disagree with that assessment. But questioning their motives or their commitment to the membership doesn't match what I've seen.

The cynicism that "both sides are screwing us" made sense in 2014. It made sense in 2008. I'm not sure it makes sense with the people sitting at this table in 2026. The offer reflects that shift. Not perfectly, but meaningfully.

I'm not telling anyone how to vote. But I am saying: read the actual offer, and the red-line if you can. Run your own numbers, and compare it to what we had. Not to some hypothetical contract that doesn't exist. The deadline is August 22. After that, the early incentives are gone.

I'm voting yes.

Their appears to be a worklife outage, anyone else having issues?

View Poll

For everyone wondering why people are saying no? We're not far off from a reasonable and fair offer.

**Wage Pools and P/OOS:**

* 5% General Wage Increase (GWI) on ratification

* 6.5% wage pools each year 2027–2030 with an uncapped Q3 CPI-W floor

* 0.5%/yr promotional/out-of-sequence.

*That compounds to roughly 37.6% by 2030.* (Edit. This assumes OOS and Promo are included, average is actually 35.1% excluding these pools)

* *Tech-only: GWI retroactive to 2/20/26, to address the Prof/Tech gap dating to 2016.*

**401k: **11% company contribution in total, broken out as:

* Match held at 75% of first 8%

* Non-elective flattened from age-tiered 3/4/5% to a flat 5% for everyone.

**EIP Target: **10%

**OT: **Time + 50% of Level 1 Prof average annual pay (edit, this is around 20-22/hr)

**Vacation: **+2 days

**Early Retiree Medical (ERM):**

Access to everyone at age 55. Premiums would be the responsibility of member.

HRA to help pay for ERM premiums would be funded by putting the value of the sick leave you normally lose every year into the HRA at your current hourly rate. 6% return on assets (2025 annual report estimated ROl for pension plan assets)

**Medical Paybands: **Raise to $150k/$300k thresholds, same cost-share percentages

**Bereavement: **3 days/year, doesn't require burning sick leave or vacation

**Floating holiday: **1 day

**Sabbatical: **4 weeks unpaid sabbatical per 7-year (with benefits)

For those of you wondering why you should VOTE NO, this offer was presented to Boeing based on feedback from the membership using the negotiation prep surveys and market data.

Boeing turned around, stole a million concessions from an arguably pretty reasonable offer, and gave us a slap in the face of a contract.

This is what the NOs are fighting for, and none of it is out of the ordinary for the industry except for the 401k percentage.

VOTE NO ON THIS RIDICULOUS FARCE OF A CONTRACT, AND AUTHORIZE A STRIKE

Edit: this information was given out by an AR and some CRs

Hello brothers and sisters,

A LOT is going on and being misrepresented.

Let's approach this analytically. We're engineers and technical workers — use that.
I'd invite you to comment on your top 5 (both positive and negative), for both the economic & non-economic offer. Why? Because this will help everyone.

I've read most of the offer (~150 pgs) and it's my honest approach:

(A) Non-eco
(1) (-) LOU - Committment. Even though, I see the progress in the fluffy language of commitment, from the previous contract until now, and apparently Stephanie Pope herself wrote it - goodwill and atmosphere aren't self-enforcing. It's not tied to Article 3 gradeability, can be true today and irrelevant in a future RIF. The intent is right; whether it survives contact with a grievance is the BIG open question. Understandably, this is a HUGE area for the techs, who have been devasted by offshoring.
(2) (+) Functional reps: creation of new union-represented workforce roles tied to future skills. Boeing is agreeing to bring new job classifications into the bargaining unit as skill needs evolve, rather than letting new work get created and staffed outside SPEEA's jurisdiction by default. Art. 22 doesn't look like much changed, but this is in the spirit of not getting movement in SJCs. The long-run risk isn't just Boeing reclassifying existing roles to control layoffs it's newly created roles (AI-adjacent work being the obvious one) simply never entering the bargaining unit in the first place, which shrinks union jurisdiction over time without ever triggering a grievable classification dispute. A standing commitment to route future-skill roles into union representation is a hedge against that scope erosion, even though it's not phrased as a scope-protection clause.
(3) (-) AI governance is a study committee, not enforcement. I get this probably took a lot to even get Boeing to entertain, a lot of CBAs are having a hard time rn getting AI protection language in them, some don't have any and it is more than what IAM got but there's no enforcement mechanism, no stated grievance or arbitration mechanism attached to the AI LOU, the exact "protection on paper, unenforceable in practice" failure pattern, on arguably the highest-stakes issue of the next 4 years. The set letter is also interesting because I didn't even think of HR related AI stuff.
(4) (+) Work/life flexibility & overall improvements: Virtual work no longer faces upper-level bans as there's now a defined request/appeal process (I think this process is not required but it helps codify managers that aren't already doing so, I'm not sure why people are making this into a negative but I could be wrong). Alternate work schedules (4x10s, 9x80s, 3x12s) are explicitly codified. Part-time access improves on two fronts: the minimum-hours threshold to keep full benefits drops from 32.1 to 24 hours, aimed at life events like a new baby, a sick family member, or a phased retirement; and LOU 11 requires part-time request approvals not be unreasonably withheld. On top of that, members get two extra vacation days (the first across-the-board increase since 1983) plus a floating holiday, and bereavement leave that no longer depletes vacation or sick balances.
(5) (+) Unanimous NT endorsement is a good signal, not just optics. 10 people going unanimous is harder to get on a weak deal than a good one. This is pretty rare in NT of this size, which is bigger than typical sized SPEEA NTs (~6). So what this also tells us is they all agreed that this was the most they could get with the leverage they had - so this is a signal to all of us - give them more to get more. Regardless of the contract vote, we all need to give a YES vote to a strike so they can go to the table with the maximum leverage position.
Overall = positive (3 + / 2 -).
(B) Eco
(1) (+) The money is cash-forward, not deferred or stock-heavy. It's the right architecture: Retro 3% is a real win, 40% of the 2026 bonus as a lump sum, and a higher bonus target are all cash that compounds into pension math, overtime, and future raise pools. I know a lot of people were disappointed in the salary wage pool numbers (3% (retro, at ratification) + 7% (March 2027) + 5.5% + 5.5% + 5.5% = compounds to 29.4%), but the way it is set up is what we want, we just want more. A lot of why most people want more is IAM (compounded 38%) but remember: (1) you are judging a different union's number who has suffered much more than we have, I'm honestly not sure if that's even the correct goal to shoot for (we got 68% of IAM's number without a strike) (2) they had to strike for 53 days to get that(that's ballsy because after 100 days of a non-economic strike Boeing can legally fire all of us and replace us, what IAM achieved was incredible, I just don't see the same type of fight, specifically in the profs) & (3) it's early.
(2) (-) The overtime premium problem carries forward untouched (sorry techs this is a huge prof centric issue). The flat $6.50 premium hasn't moved since 1989 which is good that is has moved... however it still isn't indexed to anything. Also Wichita won $8.50, so this feels like Boeing chocked the NT by giving them something but nothing they have acquiesced to before. Yes, tons of engineers across the nation rarely get OT, but this is something that was won by the union many years ago and has been neglected in compensation and abused by specifically production engineers - these profs feel this the most. Some of us have been working OT 20% for years.
(3) (+) Early Retiree Medical tied to sick leave conversion. This a genuine positive because its low cash way to get ERM at 55 yrs old, and it addresses the loss of sick leave. The value: unused sick leave that would otherwise just sit on the books (or get hit by the 50% rollover haircut you've flagged as a leakage point) instead converts into funded medical coverage for the gap between early retirement and Medicare eligibility. That age gap of retiring before 65 without employer-sponsored coverage is one of the most expensive exposure windows a worker faces, and it's exactly the kind of benefit that's easy to undervalue when you're 30 but becomes decisive when you're 58 deciding whether you can actually afford to leave. It converts an asset members are already accruing (sick leave) into protection against a real, otherwise-uninsured financial risk, rather than letting that accrued value evaporate at rollover or go unused entirely if someone stays healthy. The negative however, is that now you have to hold on to your sick time to fund this mechanism.
(4) (-) COLA is improved but not fixed. The COLA guarantee is directionally the right kind of fix — a guaranteed minimum tied to inflation is structurally different from the old Art 11.1(c), which required clearing a cumulative threshold that never triggered across seven review periods, so a default-applies floor is a real improvement if it's accurate. But whether it's actually good depends on mechanics that aren't known such as the comparison period and formula, and whether the 3% cap binds often enough to matter (inflation running hotter than 3% would reproduce the old gap in a new shape). If anyone has more information on this one - this is one that make sense to me on the surface but I could be missing something.
(5) (-) RSU reintroduction. To me this one was just weird.~$9K of restricted Boeing stock sitting outside base pay, it doesn't compound into future wage pools, doesn't count toward pension, doesn't factor into overtime, and transfers Boeing's financial and market risk onto members. The dollar amount is small; the precedent it sets for future contracts is the actual concern. I see how in other industries like big tech this is a huge thing and most of their compensation is tied up in similar 3 yr vesting periods but it changes the relationship with the union which may actually lead to increased gains $$$ but the trade-off would be business compliance vs union solidary. I'm sure this is something Boeing threw at them because of Boeing's debt situation (~$50B). Not justifying it, but it makes sense to offer something like that if that's Boeing's posturing.

Overall = negative (3- / 2+).