As air travel continues to be at a historical low, airline workers fear for their jobs and health care plans with the termination of the CARES Act Aviation Payroll Support Program (PSP) looming on Sept. 30. This aid has sustained an industry of national importance, helped our economy, and preserved our communities’ connectivity, especially in Alaska, to the national and global economy by preventing mass layoffs and involuntary furloughs to airline workers.
As airline management has acknowledged, should Oct. 1 arrive without the extension of the PSP grants, thousands of airline employees will be without a job and health care – not only in aviation, but across our entire economy. Further, the industry would lose a large portion of the experienced and credentialed workforce that will be critical to bringing the sector and the broader economy back to the prosperity once the COVID-19 crisis is over. Airline industry employment cannot simply be put back together overnight, and mass layoffs will do significant damage to the sector, with potential irrevocable consequences.
Anchorage’s Ted Stevens International Airport serves the majority of the state’s travelers and is the base for over 1,000 Alaska Airlines flight attendants, pilots, mechanics, customer service agents, and ramp agents – all of whom are at risk if the program does not get extended. These airline workers are essential to our unique communities’ needs for medical attention, supplies, and connection to the rest of our vast state and the Lower 48.
We need a clean extension of the PSP through March 31, 2021, allowing the worker’s first program to continue. This is the simplest and fastest way to maintain our historic commitment to aviation workers who are on the front lines of this deadly virus. Aviation workers are essential, now more than ever, to our state.
Matthew Cook
Association of Flight Attendants-CWA Anchorage Local President
Anchorage
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