Southwest Airlines Pilots to Vote on New Contract After Board Approval

Southwest Airlines pilots will vote on a new contract with the carrier that includes a 50% pay raise over the pact’s five-year term after their union leadership deemed the terms acceptable.

The carrier’s 11,000 pilots will vote through Jan. 22, the Southwest Airlines Pilots Association said Wednesday after its 25-member board of directors voted on whether to forward the agreement to the full membership. 

“The board believes this agreement achieves the goals of the pilot group, provides security for their families, and rewards their industry-leading productivity,” SWAPA said in a statement.

If pilots ratify the agreement, Southwest would become the last of the four major U.S. airlines to reach a new deal with pilots — worth billions of dollars in new salary and benefit increases — within the past year.

Neither the union nor the airline had an immediate comment on the board decision.

Casey Murray, president of the Southwest pilots union, told CNBC on Tuesday that the new five-year contract would be worth about $12 billion. American Airlines pilots said their new contract, approved by the pilots in August, amounts to $9.6 billion in pay and benefits increases over four years. Likewise, United pilots valued their four-year contract, ratified a month later, at more than $10 billion.

When the contract becomes amendable in December 2028, Southwest would pay pilots a 2.5% annual bonus until the parties reach a new agreement. 

The pilots’ current contract became amendable in September 2020. Under the Railway Labor Act, which governs aviation contracts, union contracts don’t expire but carry on under the existing terms until they are amended.