• Please take a moment and update your account profile. If you have an updated account profile with basic information on why you are on Air Warriors it will help other people respond to your posts. How do you update your profile you ask?

    Go here:

    Edit Account Details and Profile

The SHOW: Airlines still a "good gig"??

Griz882

Frightening children with the Griz-O-Copter!
pilot
Contributor
So Fauci wants masks a permanent part of 121 passenger travel, enforced by TSA at airport entry. Also Vax mandates for crew members and pax coming from DOT and FAA.

Crazy. Just like the TSA and response to 9/11, we will have a heap of regs affecting industry and air travel that will never disappear - this bell will never get "unrung".
I’ll be honest, this would seriously cut my airline travel. I don’t mind a lot of the day-to-day hassles but wearing a mask on an airplane ride that is over a few hours is just too much.
 

Brett327

Well-Known Member
None
Super Moderator
Contributor
I can explain it to you Brett, but I can't understand it for you . . . .

You're a smart guy, you'll figure it out eventually . . . ?
Great, please explain how the incumbent admin is advantaged by this?
 

ChuckMK23

FERS and TSP contributor!
pilot
Is there a thought process that says this is all engineered? What I don't understand is the view that the world of December 2019 was flawed or evil and we must never return to those societal and economic norms. Why can't we just return to December 2019? Why do the political winds keep generating one crises after another?

Here's what I think.Given the efficacy of the vaccines, we (the vaccinated) do not need to live in fear of this virus. We do not need to be wearing masks or getting tested or quarantining or doing contact tracing. All of those things are based upon the obsolete premise that we can and should be trying to prevent transmission. The pandemic is over (for the vaccinated). It is time that we accept that and move on. Accept that most of us will encounter, will get, and will transmit this virus. For those who live with medically vulnerable people, they are free to take extra precautions (wearing N95 mask in public).
 

robav8r

Well-Known Member
None
Contributor
Interesting article on current and projected pilot shortfalls . . . .

"Long-time airline analyst Helane Becker of Cowen estimates the industry may need 35,000 to 40,000 new pilots over the next decade — to offset an increase in retirements and keep pace with travel demand."
 

Jim123

DD-214 in hand and I'm gonna party like it's 1998
pilot
Interesting article on current and projected pilot shortfalls . . . .

"Long-time airline analyst Helane Becker of Cowen estimates the industry may need 35,000 to 40,000 new pilots over the next decade — to offset an increase in retirements and keep pace with travel demand."
if the industry doesn't see an influx of pilots, the airlines will be forced to cut flights to smaller cities. In effect, they would miss out on sales and profits.

Maybe that means the U.S. regionals will try to leverage that to drum up higher subsidies for Essential Air Service routes. These are typically the smaller cities where the municipal airport is a short drive but the nearest regional airport is an hour or two away, so they get daily flights from the municipal airport direct to a hub or hubs.

I can see how it could happen- full pilot staffing, to include unprofitable routes where you only put a handful of passengers on a 50 seat jet (or a turboprop with fewer seats), is more expensive this day and age with all the job mobility, churn, training costs, etc. The last few months have had a lot of "these cities cut by ____" articles in the travel blog world as well as more media traffic about the demise of the 50 seat regional jets that serve those segments. Those fleets are worn out as it is, they have worse gas and maintenance per passenger mile costs, and the economics of seats per pilot are self-explanatory, but up until 2021 the industry had enough pilots and revenue to put pilots in those seats and fly those routes.

It's a fair chunk of regional flying and it's a good system for building up pilot experience. It's like a little leagues but with big league consequences—flying scheduled air service to sometimes challenging airports with weather, short runways, surrounding terrain—and it does make for a collectively smarter airline pilot population. So maybe the airline industry might use the safety angle to get more government cheese. A good way to pay for expensive things is to use other people's money...

There's going to be more pressure to bump up the mandatory retirement age a couple more years and to reduce pilot minimum certification and/or experience requirements. It's gonna be fun watching Congress argue about both of those things, especially the second thing.
 

SynixMan

HKG Based Artificial Excrement Pilot
pilot
Contributor
As has been stated many times, there's only a shortage of pilots willing to work for Regional FO wages (about $50k/yr now thanks to supply and demand). Don't feel bad for airline CEOs in the slightest. They can bring whatever small jets they want on property and pay real wages, benefits, and seniority for them. They just don't want to.
 

Python

Well-Known Member
pilot
Contributor
As has been stated many times, there's only a shortage of pilots willing to work for Regional FO wages (about $50k/yr now thanks to supply and demand). Don't feel bad for airline CEOs in the slightest. They can bring whatever small jets they want on property and pay real wages, benefits, and seniority for them. They just don't want to.

I don’t feel bad for the CEOs at all and I agree with you about that part.

I do disagree though that it’s a shortage of pilots willing to work for regional wages. I honestly believed this WAS the case, but isn’t anymore, yet is still stated just due to inertia. Regional wages used to be half of what they are. Furthermore, it legitimately is a problem of number of pilots required vs available (using “number of ATPs” from the FAA website indicates a surplus, but doesn’t account for those retired, inactive, disabled, mil leave, etc.). Finally, the application pool at the regionals is thousands and thousands deep. People ARE willing to work for the wages currently offered. Based on all the data I’ve seen, it’s a legitimate supply problem to staff the airlines for the foreseeable future.
 

sevenhelmet

Low calorie attack from the Heartland
pilot
I don’t feel bad for the CEOs at all and I agree with you about that part.

I do disagree though that it’s a shortage of pilots willing to work for regional wages. I honestly believed this WAS the case, but isn’t anymore, yet is still stated just due to inertia. Regional wages used to be half of what they are. Furthermore, it legitimately is a problem of number of pilots required vs available (using “number of ATPs” from the FAA website indicates a surplus, but doesn’t account for those retired, inactive, disabled, mil leave, etc.). Finally, the application pool at the regionals is thousands and thousands deep. People ARE willing to work for the wages currently offered. Based on all the data I’ve seen, it’s a legitimate supply problem to staff the airlines for the foreseeable future.
Trying to reconcile these two sentences.

I think what you're digging at is that the time to hire/train new pilots is the bottleneck, in which case, I agree.
 

wink

War Hoover NFO.
None
Super Moderator
Contributor
I taught full time at a HS avaition program that prepped kids for pro pilot and AMT. Led right into a college program. Still sub there frequently. Not one of those guys is deterred by Regional pilot wages. I have never heard a concern for pay.

I believe the predominate view here is influanced by the typical lifestyle and income a pilot coming off active duty would like to maintain. If you are coming up on the civ track most guys see a slight pay raise over their previous flying gig when going to fly RJs. Most are younger than mil guys and fewer married with kids. I had to spend time at a small commuter flying turbo props no larger than 36 seats. Pay was poor. I could afford it because Mrs Wink worked. But most of my colleagues were in mid to late 20s and unmarried. They were having a blast. Paid to fly and build time. That is all they wanted.
 

Jim123

DD-214 in hand and I'm gonna party like it's 1998
pilot
I believe the predominate view here is influanced by the typical lifestyle and income a pilot coming off active duty would like to maintain. If you are coming up on the civ track most guys see a slight pay raise over their previous flying gig when going to fly RJs. Most are younger than mil guys and fewer married with kids. I had to spend time at a small commuter flying turbo props no larger than 36 seats. Pay was poor. I could afford it because Mrs Wink worked. But most of my colleagues were in mid to late 20s and unmarried. They were having a blast. Paid to fly and build time. That is all they wanted.

Health care figures into that a bit these days too. Mil guy or gal getting out at ~10 years? Going to the reserves? Tricare reserve takes a lot of the edge off. Going cold turkey into civilian land and having to pay in to the regional's healthcare plan, that's a very big hit on the active duty O3 lifestyle!

Going from time building as a twenty-something CFI or Part 135 pilot, being used to living whatever lifestyle that makes ends meet (old car or no car, living with parents or roommates), year one regional FO pay is a pay bump. Even more so for people with pilot program student loans- those guys are used to having near-zero disposable income from whatever the last job paid.
 
Top