I'm British and used to work for a regional over there. Firstly, terms and conditions are generally a lot better, in fact if I hadn't married an American girl I'd probably still be flying over there. An EMB-145 FO earns a starting salary of £34,500 ($52,000) and a CA earns about £68,000 ($95,000). That is at bmi regional, a wholly owned subsidiary of bmi British Midland.

None of the regionals in Europe fly under CPAs or Fee For Departure like they do over here. Regional partners are either fully owned subsidiaries like bmi regional and Lufthansa Cityline or they are franchise partners, paying the airline whose name they operate under a fee to use their brand/web site/booking engine. Loganair used to do this operating as a franchise of British Airways, but since BA sold off their own subsidiary BA Connect to Flybe in 2007, Loganair now flies under the Flybe brand. If not operating as a subsidiary or franchise then most other regionals are independent, the biggest being Flybe, but there are many others such as Eastern Airways, Aer Arann, Skywork, Darwin Airline, Jetair, CityJet etc.

It's worth mentioning that getting a job in Europe is a lot harder than it is over here. Firstly you require a JAA licence and the conversion is not easy. Secondly you'll need the right to live and work in the EU and this is hard to come by unless you marry a local or have a European passport. Many carriers also require that you speak the local language. And finally many airlines expect you to pay for your type rating and in some cases even for time on type before even considering offering you a job. The market is saturated beyond belief out there at the moment, and it could be argued that the social and economic outlook in Europe is even worse than it is over here.