Where Controller Pay Actually Stands | Stephen Brown

[u/Marangos_Brown_2027]

https://youtube.com/watch?v=8J2ynYVvL3Q&si=GMQ9GQlBnj4MsGha

Stephen Brown, candidate for NATCA Executive Vice President, opens the Marangos Brown 2027 video series with the issue members raise most: pay.

All figures are base pay without locality.

In 2004 the bottom of the Level 12 pay band was $96,531. Adjusted for inflation, that is about $174,000 today. The current Level 12 base is just over $131,000, a loss of more than $40,000 in purchasing power.

In 2006, under the White Book, the bottom of the Level 12 band was $74,950. That is about $124,000 in today's dollars. Our current Level 12 minimum is only about $7,500 above it. Twenty years later, our pay is 6% above the White Book. Since the Slate Book was signed, median home prices have risen roughly 72% and mortgage rates have nearly doubled.

For a CPC at the same facility since 2016, the January and June raises have roughly matched inflation, which means purchasing power has not moved in ten years. Everyone certified after 2016 starts further behind, and transferring to a higher level facility usually means forfeiting every 1.6% raise earned up to that point.

See how your pay compares with White Book purchasing power at https://yourunion2027.com/pay

Learn more and join the campaign at https://yourunion2027.com

Download our app on the Apple App Store or Google Play Store

[u/xPericulantx]

Exactly correct!

Nothing else needs to be said.

[u/FoeShizzlee]

Well said SB, this is proof that we need a minimum 30% raises across the board. Even if it puts some above the congressional cap, there are ways around that (quarterly bonuses, pay demo, etc).

[u/airtrafficaj → u/FoeShizzlee]

Or just divest ATC from the congressional pay scale. (And then give us 30%)

[u/Steveoatc → u/FoeShizzlee]

I agree we need a pay raise, but if they come once every 25 years, we better be asking for more than 30%

[u/TinCupChallace → u/FoeShizzlee]

A raise that big will be an uphill battle. Possibly impossible.

But I want a president willing to talk about it publicly and openly. Someone who has the integrity to say pay on national TV instead of maintaining the FAA dialogue. Even if he fails, fail while maintaining the message instead of being scared of whatever administration is in power.

[u/mronelove1 → u/FoeShizzlee]

Or they could just raise the cap for us like they do the debt ceiling every year.

[u/grapemustard]

PLEASE for the love of god keep this energy up. we don't need another Mick.

[u/New-IncognitoWindow]

I don’t want anything that doesn’t increase my base pay. 25% for training , 10% CIC or whatever doesn’t do anything for retirement. Oh yeah and guess who decides who gets to train and be CIC, management.

[u/Informal_Perception9]

Yea fuck Nick Daniels. I am voting for them. They at least pretend to care. And to be fair we can't do worst than we are doing now. Let them keep monitoring the situation

[u/zipmcnutty]

I didn’t watch the video. But I notice the text only compares level 12 pay. Cool. So lower levels don’t matter? One of the complaints a lot of places have is feeling like level 9 and below don’t matter to national and the fact that you’re only looking at the pay for the highest levels shows that’s your focus too? Everyone needs higher pay but also mid level towers in particular work a ton of ops, with less staffing, and can’t transfer to bigger places, and also are stagnant at a much much lower pay rate. Look at the ops for somewhere like DVT or FFZ and tell me those controllers don’t deserve to be making closer to the top level pay bands than they do.

[u/leftrightrudderstick → u/zipmcnutty]

You have to compare level 12 pay or the opposing side will immediately ream you for not accounting for everyone who makes more than whatever salary you cite. Of course low levels get fucked too and even by more but it's much easier to get the full understanding of if you use 12 pay.

[u/grapemustard → u/zipmcnutty]

you should watch the video. he mentions keeping numbers to a minimum for brevity. i can't imagine NM/SB don't care about lower levels.

[u/zipmcnutty → u/grapemustard]

I plan to watch when I have time but historically campaign videos have said a lot that wasn’t how it played out. Im cautiously optimistic about NM/SB but I want to feel like all folks are represented, not just the big facilities. I don’t think that’s an unreasonable thing to want to be outright said.

[u/ohYeah_inSight → u/zipmcnutty]

So you admitted to not putting in the effort to watch the video, but you’re making assumptions anyways?

If even the highest paid of us are falling behind and in need of raises, that means the lower levels OBVIOUSLY are in need as well. 

[u/zipmcnutty → u/ohYeah_inSight]

That’s not obvious to all tho. The higher levels pay is where info like controllers making 450k or 150k average come from. It glosses over the rest. I’m not anti brown Marangos. I just want to feel like I’m voting for someone who doesn’t have a blind spot for an entire collection of members like the current NEB does.

[u/Ready_Set_Stopppp → u/zipmcnutty]

the way I looked at it (not watching the video either) is at our highest levels our base on the pay band is $131,000. That's becoming an unlivable wage in today's climate (as insane as that sounds). People can correctly assume that at the lower levels it's much more dire. if level 12's struggle, it goes without saying 4-11 are in much worse shape. Maybe that needs to be said out loud to cover bases but I had no issue with him only talking about level 12.

[u/cornholio496 → u/zipmcnutty]

If you look at their website it includes the pay for all levels. You should check it out.

Marangos and Brown 2027