My point is that it costs a lot of money to reach middle class these days. One needs to take a holistic approach to studying pilot compensation. Employer paid retirements are gone. Wages are down while work rules are worse. If someone really is bent upon throwing their lives away then my hat is off to them. However if you harbor dreams of a wife, home, kids and white picket fence then perhaps you had better look elsewhere than an aviation career.

We can not look to the prior generation as an example of the future. Those days are gone forever. One needs to peer ahead 30 years with expectations of furloughs, moves, layoffs and further pay cuts. Pilots love to pull the wool over their own eyes and intentionally fail to recognise the truths that are blatant. As previously mentioned the median home price in Seattle is 440K. Regular people with common jobs are able to pay those prices. 52K and the left seat at a regional will not cut it.

SkyHigh