US airlines award big pay rises amid record profits

Dallas

US airlines are posting record profits, awarding hefty pay rises and winning over long-time sceptics such as Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway Inc. The missing ingredient: proof that the industry can weather a downturn.

Previous airline booms were followed by busts that eventually forced all the biggest full-service airlines into bankruptcy. The difference this time is an eight-year era of mergers that stabilised the industry by shrinking the number of major US carriers to four from nine. Adding to that is a profit-boosting, 56 per cent drop in the price of jet fuel since early 2014.

Airline labour groups have taken advantage of the good times to claw back some of the pay surre…