Majors not hiring prior to a known shortage..
Mark My Words:
I've got a theory about all this non-hiring just before the shortage. There WILL be a massive shortage due to all the factors we are familiar with. The major airlines will have purposely held off hiring in anticipation of this. Then there WILL be a major disruption to the "flow of commerce" and then they will go to congress "Needing relief" from regulatory hurdles. Then hold on to your hat that they want us to wear to look professional. Everything will be on the table. They will be asking for congressional relief from scope clauses, the FO ATP rule, any new rest requirements that might or might not be in place at that point, and (here is the big one) CABOTAGE! That's right. They will be going after the entire U.S. Airline industry in favor of using other country's airlines to do the flying. They will claim that there was no way they could have predicted these pilot shortages and could not possibly absorb the costs of all this training with out going bankrupt. All along, they will have purposly painted themselves into a corner while maintaining that they were all just too short sighted, stupid and dumb to realise this was coming.
Dumb? ...Dumb like a Fox!
Thoughts?