Originally Posted by
Duksrule
$180K for college? Did you go to med school with a pilot program? Harvard is $36K a year for tuition 2011/12. $180K for a pilots license is pretty crazy. As for the $45K a year, there are people that would gladly take that pay in the regular world. $15/hr for a normal job of 2080 hours a year is $31K a year. There are plenty of people in america making $31K a year (unfortunately a lot of teachers come to mind) and happy to have a job.
I know that the pay in this industry sucks and everyone hates it. If an individual hates it so much though, QUIT and find another career. The current pay is common knowledge and people still come into this field then complain the entire time. At least you aren't an E-1 making $17892/yr getting shot at for a living. Seems to be the American way to complain about your salary rather than doing something about it. My wife is a prime example. She is a teacher with a Masters Degree making crap. She complains about it just about every day and my response is, "take your education and do something other than teach" to which she replies "but I love teaching". You don't get to have your cake and eat it to. If you love your job so much that you accept the low pay, don't complain about the pay. If you want to be paid more, go into a field with higher salaries.
This post is not in any way directed at afterburn or anyone else in particular. It is just a general statement.
Just to be clear, Harvard tuition goes up to and over $50k/year when factoring in books and other expenses. After graduation it is safe to say they have a high paying career waiting.
For pilots, I know for a fact that somebody who attends ERAU will have $100k of debt to their name. This to earn below poverty wages after graduation as a flight instructor and regional FO.
The whole, "if you don't like it leave" mentality needs to die. The only options in this industry is not "bend over and like it" or "leave". It's because of that kind of logic that we are in the situation we are in.
There needs to be change. That change will not come from the general public, but from pilots bringing up issues and waving a flag. If we don't look out for ourselves nobody will.
The flying public doesn't care about how much we make. It doesn't matter how many PBS specials are done on low salaries, in the end all they care about is putting on their sweat pants and flip flops and paying the lowest possible price for a roundtrip ticket to Vegas.