The recent labour dispute between Air Canada and its flight attendants pulled back the curtain on one of the airline industry’s longest-standing injustices: flight attendants are paid only when planes are in motion, a practice that has persisted for more than 60 years across the global aviation industry.

On Aug. 14, Air Canada began cancelling flights ahead of a potential strike to allow an “orderly shutdown.” The strike started on Aug. 16, but less than 12 hours into it, the federal government attempted to force binding arbitration between the airline and its union.

The union defied the government order to return to work — an order that was never ratified by the court — until a tentative agreement was reached in the early hours of Aug. 19.

Much was at stake during the conflict, and both unions and carriers around the world likely followed it closely. Passenger traffic had returned to pre-pandemic levels, but

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