Recently, we’ve seen major airlines in the United States report their financial results for 2025. Among the “big three” carriers, the results are exactly what you’d expect — Delta had the best performance, United was in second place, and American was a distant third.
Related to this, one interesting thing has been seeing how profit sharing differs at these carriers. Following its full-year earnings report, American revealed the details of its employee profit sharing for 2025, and the numbers are leaving employees very frustrated.
American employees furious over profit sharing amounts
JonNYC shares American’s profit sharing numbers based on 2025 performance. It would appear that the carrier’s standard profit sharing for 2025 will be 0.3% of eligible pay. So as an example, if an employee had $50,000 in eligible pay, they’d be eligible for a bonus of $150.
For the previous year (2024), American employees received profit sharing equal to 1-1.5% of their eligible pay. So it’s not like they’re used to big profit sharing checks, unlike at Delta. The biggest profit sharing that American employees ever saw was in 2016, when they received 3% profit sharing.
As a point of comparison, at Delta, employees are receiving profit sharing equal to 8.9% of their eligible pay. So assuming that employees at the two airlines are otherwise paid equally, Delta’s profit sharing is roughly 30x as high as American’s.
While Delta employees might be making some major purchases with their profit sharing checks, or might be paying off loads, American employees can maybe go out for a nice dinner.
My gosh, it has to be really demotivating to be an American employee, to put in your best effort, and then to receive a profit sharing check like that. It almost gets into the “why bother” category, which, come and think of, probably also describes American’s profitability.
Maybe American management should have a new pay structure?
While American employees will be cut a profit sharing check ranging from tens of dollars to hundreds of dollars (maybe low four figures for senior pilots), American CEO Robert Isom continues to earn eight figures. I haven’t yet seen his numbers for 2025, but Isom earned $15.6 million in 2024, and $31.4 million in 2023.
It’s amazing how American’s board seemingly settles for the direction that Isom’s team is leading the company, given the lackluster performance. And I guess they must be happy with what’s going on, or Isom wouldn’t be rewarded so generously.
Here’s an idea — how about paying American’s top executives purely in the form of profit sharing? Make it a similar formula to what employees get. They get a small percentage of the first $2.5 billion in profits, and a bigger percentage of profits above that. Let’s see how that works out.
So much about the way that publicly traded companies in the US do business just makes little sense to me, in particular the relationship between executives and the board. For how many years can you let someone keep doing the same thing while underperforming, without thinking that it might be better to try a fresh approach?
It’s just a shame that frontline staff are stuck working for a management team that has no vision, where they’re unlikely to see any meaningful profit sharing check at any point in their career.
Bottom line
American has revealed its profit sharing structure based on 2025 financial performance, and employees can expect bonuses of 0.3%. So if someone earns $50,000, they can expect a bonus of $150. Suffice it to say that a 0.3% profit sharing check is a far cry from Delta’s 8.9% profit sharing, which is roughly 30x as much.
Ultimately at American there just aren’t many profits to share, and that’s the fault of the company’s leadership team, which can’t seem to develop a cohesive strategy. American is essentially a high cost version of a low cost carrier, except with a lucrative loyalty program.
What do you make of this American profit sharing mess?
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