Originally Posted by fosters

Because regional contracts made it financially viable to send those aircraft to the regionals. A 76 seater at NWA, the FO was making $40 (first year) to $130, and CA's were making $175 to $191/hr (yr 12) preconcession.

At a regional? $20/hr to $40/hr for FO's, $60/hr to $110/hr (yr 18) for CA's.

Gee, I wonder why they are at the regionals?

IOW, it was a combination of the two - mainline pilots trying to save their pensions for farming out more flying and selling us down the river, and regional MEC's wanting the growth with crap contracts (or in the case of skywest, just agreeing to fly the damn things for their 50 seat rate).

I don't think people realize just how many good jobs disappeared with the introduction of these 70+ seat aircraft at the regional level. Instead of being at mainline making over $100k your second year, $200k+ as a CA you are at a regional making $30k as an FO and $60k as a CA.