Originally Posted by
BeardedFlyer
Due to the nepotism at most of the majors the sons and daughters (especially daughters!) of airline pilots would be foolish not to go for it...
I am not inside the airlines to know how much of an advantage nepotism is to offspring of pilots, but I doubt it is a done ticket to the parents airline. Maybe an interview, but far from a done deal.
...8 years to El Capitán? What am I missing here? I see at Skywest it should be around 5 years to upgrade and making 60k; American Eagle, 4 years and about 60k. $5,000 a month doesn't seem that bad for a 20 something yr old, or even a 30 or 40 something yr old for that matter.
Again I am not in the business enough to know what the average upgrade time is across all the airlines, regional included, but I hear it is possible to really get the shaft on this.
...Say for whatever reason, you don't make it to a major and are faced with the apparent "worst case scenario" according to many; stuck at a regional. Well aww darn, that means your pay will only cap out around $100,000; Shoot, I guess you'll never make it out of the projects...
Yeah but that's my point, if you get stuck at a regional you probably would have done better at engineering and flying on weekends. But I will concede the point that for may people who can't obtain an engineering degree this might seem like and attractive option. I know several engineers who are in fact stuck at regionals and they have mixed opinions about it. They aren't doing what they thought they would be doing in the airlines. None is very happy with how things turned out.
...Yes, there is a cost to getting your pilot ratings but when you put it all in perspective I wouldn't call the cost heavy. You should be able to go from PPL to CFI with under $20k. + 3 for the MEI and make it $23,000 approx. Now let me add the fact that the only educational req for the regionals is a HS diploma.
Now you are really reaching. Many pilots come out of ALLATPs and many of the other schools with north of six figures debt and more. I also challenge the idea that going the FBO route is going to only cost $30k now, more like $50k. I admit I need to tally up the costs for all the tickets since the fuel went up a year or two ago, but it was around $50k even before the fuel was tacked on when I got all my tickets. And that does not include college, and if you go to the regionals without college you are stuck there from what I hear. So you need that $50k worth of state college and you need those $50k worth of FBO flight ratings if you are going to do it for the lowest cost. That's still six figures total. I known because I went to a state college and I did all my flight tickets through flying clubs, employee clubs, and FBOs.
...What does an engineering degree cost at a reputable university? Double that at least.
I went to a world class engineering school on full scholarship and I still had a bunch of student loans to pay back for living expenses. I did not even pay tuition and came out with about $65k in debt. However, some of that was used for flight tickets so I am not sure how much was only due to that. You can look up on any college website how much it costs to go there. Coming out with north of 6 figures is common.
...Furloughs are scary, but what job is immune to a slow economy? Layoffs happen in a free market economy. As for the competitive nature of the biz, tell me what job I can safely apply for with no risk of rejection or competition from others....
Yeah but airlines are notorious for up and down cycles, even more often than the larger economy. You run a large risk of getting furloughed at any airline.
Again, if a kid comes along and says airline pilot is for me I am all for it. It is a noble profession, rewarding for many, and crucial to the world we live in. But if the other options is engineering, I would caution anyone making such a decision. Engineering is at least as good an option and arguably a better one. Only if a kid said he hated engineering would I steer them to the airlines.