Tilton celebrates United's recovery, but employees upset over pay

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/business/20070510-1359-ual-shareholders.html

Tilton celebrates United's recovery, but employees upset over pay

By Dave Carpenter
ASSOCIATED PRESS

1:59 p.m. May 10, 2007

CHICAGO – UAL Corp. Chairman and CEO Glenn Tilton touted the once-bankrupt company's revival Thursday at the first shareholder meeting since 2002 for United Airlines' parent, but was partially upstaged by employees angry about executive pay.

Hundreds of pilots, flight attendants and other uniformed employees demonstrated outside the meeting and some inside challenged Tilton over what they see as excessive pay for the company's top managers and a shortage of personnel.

“Employee morale is at an all-time low,” said pilot Margaret Freeman, a 767 captain and 18-year veteran of United. “Your employees are no longer behind you” – a remark that drew loud applause from some of her co-workers.

Tilton, who oversaw the three-year bankruptcy restructuring that made United a smaller, more cost-effective airline, said employee morale matters but pointed to the airline's financial success and comeback from the brink of liquidation as a higher priority.

“We care also ... that at the end of the day this is a sustainable enterprise,” he said. “Bankruptcy is bad for employee morale. Failure is bad for employee morale.”

FULL story at link.