The board's decision also pushed one issue into the background: whether the mechanics would agree to all the pay concessions they had been asked for to generate the savings United had promised the board.

Late last month, Mr. Mack received pay concessions from a group of about 100 investment bankers that company officials said could save the firm as much as $70 million annually.

Mechanics at US Airways have voted to reject pay concessions and said they would fight any attempt by the airline to win wage and benefit concessions through bankruptcy court.

The carrier has higher labor costs than most of its competitors because it did not go through bankruptcy, the approach some airlines took to extract a second round of pay concessions after Sept. 11, 2001.

Whether they were worried about the economy, the beating they took in the stock market or their union's pay concessions, not one of the dozen shoppers interviewed was cutting back on toy purchases.

In the 20 orchestra negotiations that took place during the last year, only one did not involve a pay concession.

Any proposal would be likely to involve pay concessions and changes in work rules to increase productivity.

In the last year, American Airlines and United Airlines have both won pay concessions from their labor groups.

USAir's pilots proposed a restructuring, offering pay concessions for equity and requiring others to sacrifice as well.

With the industry now solidly profitable, at least some local union officials are already saying they want to be rewarded for pay concessions made earlier in the decade.