I was referring to the last big hiring push which I suppose did start closer to 15 years ago, time flies! As for the rest, my comments on military pilots were in response to whomever asked why regionals and majors have similar mins in some cases and in general I think what I said is true. As for UA, clearly they had a lower min, but for me at least it's unclear why exactly that was. There's a simple, obvious answer that it allowed them to hire people they liked for whatever reasons (nepotism, EEOC, employees from other departments, interns, etc).

I'm curious if anyone knows when exactly that min started though, because I don't. I have a hunch that it predates the EEOC era because I've met several UA pilots who were hired with zero time in the 60's. That would lead me to believe there was a shortage and that UA lowered their mins quite a bit before taking the drastic step of ab initio. Is that where it came from and it never changed back till 1998? I personally don't know, maybe a UA guy who knows could comment. My comments on this come from a position of adding context as after reading numerous threads on stuff like this I think the corners are pretty well drawn and fingers are in ears. I don't want this tangent to go on and on although its been quite cordial, I was just trying to add a little pepper to the stew.