Originally Posted by rickair7777

DISCLAIMER: This is thinking from management's perspective, I am not necessarily advocating this.

Here's what I would do about pilot compensation.

One one hand you want good pilots, and some level of experience and professionalism. On the other hand high-longevity pilot workgroups will make you non-competitive against bottom-feeders.

The solution would be to hire pilots with reasonable experience, say ATP plus turbine experience or 2000 TT. My pilots would also need a degree and a pretty clean record (keep reading and I'll explain)

This will cost money, which is fine. I would pay starting FO's $40-45K. From there pay would progress modestly, capping out around $60K for line CA's. There would minimal longevity raises (enough to beat inflation plus a few beers) and the pay raise for upgrade would be modest.

This means I would have my pick of entry-level pilots, but also that my regional would appeal most to those with major airline aspirations since the opportunity to make 100K+ at my regional would be very limited.

Since I'm hiring people with good qualifications to begin with, they should have no trouble moving on when the time comes (regionals who hire pilots with GEDs will eventually be paying a $100K/year to a lot of GEDs, cuz they aint goin noplace). This turnover will help keep my overall labor costs low.

Now I still need a professional workforce, even with all that attrition. I get that by hiring the cream of the crop in the first place, and by maintaining a core cadre of senior CA's to set and maintain standards. Now I said it would be hard to make six figures at my airline but I did not say impossible... check airmen and sim instructors would get a huge raise compared to line CA's. This means those who want to stick around would have to settle for very modest income as a line pilot, or compete for a very lucrative training CA position. This would ensure that I retain enough talent to set and maintain standards.

Work rules and QOL would be good, since leveraging win-win wherever you can is just good business. I would even attempt to arrange flow-throughs with my major partners.

This simply aligns business practice with the realities of the regional business model.