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Boeing workers vote to strike

washingtonpost.com

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Re: Boeing workers vote to strike

#411

Post by weaksauce »

deepsun wrote: post #356
jandrese wrote: post #303

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On one hand I can't blame any engineer that wants to flee, but on the other Boeing really can't afford any more brain drain. We are already seeing the results of years of forcing experienced but well paid engineers out and outsourcing their jobs. Planes literally falling out of the sky, but some nice fat executive bonuses.

That is a feature of capitalism and effective market. If a company falls a little bit below competition -- market forces it do dive even deeper, die quicker. I'm not saying it's good or bad. I've seen communism, and it's much worse to help failing companies -- they tend to fail even more instead of improving. The problem now is that international market is not really fair, trade treaties help too little.

boeing isn’t a company the us government will let fail. it’s too important to have as a domestic ability.

Re: Boeing workers vote to strike

#412

Post by linguae »

Larrikin wrote: post #332
linguae wrote: post #294

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It depends on the country, though. I love Japan, where I lived for eight months and where I frequently travel to, but dealing with government services there can be stressful. Granted, the clerks are professional and cordial, but be prepared to deal with long waits and perplexing bureaucracy. The United States is not unique when it comes to the stereotypical “DMV experience.”

I actually lived in Japan for some years and was thinking specifically of them. People that care at the post office, even if they have a litany of questions, and deliver your package in pristine condition is the preferred result over crap service where nobody in the entire chain cares at all if it even shows up or if it's beat up and stuff fell out. The only government service that felt purposefully bad, like many Am…

Back in November I spent half a day at the Shinagawa immigration office to obtain a trusted travelers program pass since doing it at the airport would’ve been inconvenient for me due to my super-early arrival at Haneda and my super-late departure. It wasn’t too bad, but I spent half a day there and there were unclear instructions regarding which area I needed to wait in. Thankfully it’s all taken care of, and the reward for spending half a day at Shinagawa is using the automated kiosks whenever I enter and depart Japan, which saved me tons of time in July when I arrived at Narita, bypassing a very long visitors’ line. I go to Japan frequently and so I’ll make up for the hours I spent in Shinagawa by the time my pass expires.

Re: Boeing workers vote to strike

#413

Post by GuB-42 »

myrandomcomment wrote: post #386
GuB-42 wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, Boom is not any aerospace company, they want to make supersonic planes. Supersonic travel is expensive and environmentally unfriendly, and it will probably always be, because it requires more energy, because physics. All that for the minor advantage of saving a couple of hours on select flights. What it means is that it is a privilege for the wealthy (because it is expensive for what you get), at the expense of…

As I am currently sitting on a flight from Tokyo to SFO I would greatly appreciate the flight taking half the time. Boom should be as efficient current aircraft. They will operate at 60K feet where the drag is much less and fly for less time. Their engines are being designed to run on 80% biofuels. But let's see how it turns out in the end.

Are you travelling first class?

If you are not, then you are probably not making the right comparison. Supersonic travel will absolutely not be for those who are flying economy right now and complaining about reclining, legroom, and crying babies. The kind of things that make flights feel very long, and yet, that's how most people fly despite much superior alternatives, because it is cheaper.

Judging by how much it cost to fly on Concorde, it is reasonable to assume that a supersonic ticket will be equivalent in price to first class, or at least a very good business class.

It means a seat that can recline 180°, good enough to sleep on, an internet connection suitable for remote work, as I expect it to become standard in the near future, a decent meal and some privacy. In these conditions, saving a few hours may not be as desirable as it is in economy class. Knowing that in order to shorten your trip, you will be sacrificing some of that comfort, or pay even more, maybe getting close to private jet territory.

Re: Boeing workers vote to strike

#414

Post by Rinzler89 »

kpw94 wrote: post #381
Rinzler89 wrote: post #248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't Boeing engineers also get insurance and 401k from their employer? Plus, they'd have to learn french also. France is not very accommodating to non French speaking foreigners. Trying to get around in life with just English there outside of Paris is not easy.

> France is not very accommodating to non French speaking foreigners. Trying to get around in life with just English there outside of Paris is not easy. I don't really get this kind of comments... Usually people also say the same thing when visiting Japan. "This restaurant only has menu in Japanese and staff only speaking Japanese!!". That's true a bit everywhere in the world, isn't it? In the US, apart from places w…

Not really, the world isn't either black or white but various shades of gray. Everything North of Benelux is a lot friendlier and open to speaking English and doing things in English outside of capitals, compared to places like France where not speaking it gives you a severe handicap in life and career.

Re: Boeing workers vote to strike

#415

Post by eddd-ddde »

Balgair wrote: post #237
iancmceachern wrote: post #86

Any Boeing engineers who may be looking for alternate paths, please know that I've known many great aerospace engineers who have made a pivot to medical devices very successfully and many of the best medical devices to come out in recent years are due to such. It seems very different but really it's very similar.

I'll echo this and have done something of this path. It's a very similar field surprisingly. Quite rewarding too. The timelines for products are also about the same (years-decade). The one tip is to not bother applying to Medtronic. They don't actually hire anything outside of interns. All the job postings are for internal roles (but required by federal law to be ... blah blah blah). Suffice to say, don't bother.

I'm curious. So this company basically only hires newbies and trains them from zero to any role they might need? That's kinda cool.

Re: Boeing workers vote to strike

#416

Post by Der_Einzige »

MPSFounder wrote: post #376
jandrese wrote: post #303

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On one hand I can't blame any engineer that wants to flee, but on the other Boeing really can't afford any more brain drain. We are already seeing the results of years of forcing experienced but well paid engineers out and outsourcing their jobs. Planes literally falling out of the sky, but some nice fat executive bonuses.

Anecdotal, but out of my graduating class in chemical engineering from a University in Seattle, the top 20 students went into tech and finance. The worst performing students (by academic metrics) went to Boeing. Over time, I expect decisions to be made by engineers which are not stand outs. Coupled with the MBA trainwreck prioritizing profits and cost cutting, I expect Boeing has a very rough patch ahead.

I always wonder who these folks who graduate with excellent STEM degrees are who can't land a job.

I had a similar experience with my graduating class in undergrad computer science at a no-name state university. Of the graduating class (significantly smaller than when we started), I don't know of a single person who couldn't find some kind of gainful tech related employment - including the few folks who somehow could not code! by the end of our program. My experience is circa 2014, so only shortly after the great recession.

Where are these people who just can't get any kind of work with real CS degrees? Even the many hardcore cheaters I know of found ways into the FAANG (some have been promoted several times now too!)

Re: Boeing workers vote to strike

#417

Post by asats »

AndrewKemendo wrote: post #330

In my mind, this is an unalloyed good The practice alone of organizing labor power against owners, irrespective of the demands, given the existing state of the world, is what is needed to show Class solidarity. Simply showing class solidarity in order to kick off other strikes is valuable in and of itself. Y’all really have to understand a general strike is coming. A general strike means the labor class (you most lik…

In your profile it says you work for some company, do the founders know you want to expropriate their company? Those damn kulaks, feasting on the fruits of your labor.

Re: Boeing workers vote to strike

#418

Post by gaius_baltar »

Avshalom wrote: post #362
fecal_henge wrote: post #292

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They have nothing Tolouse right now.

That feels like too lousy of a pun to be making when we're talking about peoples lives here.

Jokes on Boeing are ok, they are just people with some loose screws.

Re: Boeing workers vote to strike

#419

Post by __xor_eax_eax »

Havoc wrote: post #200

Just watched a documentary on Boeing an hour ago. It’s incredible that they avoided criminal prosecution despite two planes crashing, door popping out and then paperwork somehow going AWOL. Also Boeing knew about wiring issues since 2022 and the FAA only issues an inspection order in ‘24. Gonna try and avoid Boeings of all types going forward

Sadly, this will kill the US. We have no other aerospace manufacturer at that scale.

Unless you're not in the US, you want Boeing to get better, not fail (or root for a competitor, but I see no such thing)

Re: Boeing workers vote to strike

#420

Post by double0jimb0 »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #347
double0jimb0 wrote: post #345

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bezos doesn’t know how to build good hardware. Plenty of examples from Amazon. Then add Blue Origin to that track record.

Sure, but can you not hire people who are good at hardware with billions of dollars of investment? Or, is it culture and an intangible ability to procure and orchestrate great people doing great work that leads to success? Think in systems. If you have the resources, and the physics demonstrate it can be done, the system is not properly configured, no?

can you not hire people who are good at hardware with billions of dollars of investment?

Clearly not in Bezos’s case.

There is no magic involved here, some people have the skill/experience to lead the design, build, and selling of innovative hardware, others don’t.

For example, for designing new rockets, one of the major things Musk innovated at SpaceX was the traditional aerospace design cycle. Instead of spending 5 years on countless analyses and few actual tests, like the incumbents did/do, SpaceX built and destructed as many prototypes as possible, learning rapidly and innovating. Musk knows what innovative design truly requires.

What did Bezos do? He hired a bunch of ex-Lockheed and Boeing engineers/leads (from an industry that for decades has not felt market-driven pressure to innovate), and those engineers/leads just kept doing things the old fashion way.

When the person in charge (Bezos) misses this detail, no amount of money or wishful thinking will fix this.

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