Originally Posted by
Paok
I dk where those figures come from. You don't make close to that maxing TPs and UTA as a copilot Lt. I was at a good regional, a great regional back in the day (Comair) I think I came home w about 14k my first year about 26k the second year. To make enough money to live off at a regional is super tough. On reserve or even as a line holding FO. I have had some reserve guard friends go regionals and quickly go on mil leave trying to find ANYTHING to get them out of the regional including deployments and non flying gigs. To pay the bills. It wasn't until recently that I realized how bad regional life was and I am not sure how I made it.
You're kind of making my point for me. If you can't break 3K as a trougher (bum) anymore, then the regional thing is probably more of a necessity now. When the Air Force is paying LT's less than regionals, we can't be shocked that regionals start to become a normal option. I do realize that as reservists these LT's aren't "entitled" to full-time employment, but this is probably the first time in 2-3 decades that our LT's really have no where else to go without stacking boxes at Home Depot part-time while living in mom's basement. In reality, the regional would be more flexible with their Mil schedule than Home Depot.
Year 1 and 2 at most regionals now is about 25K and 31K respectively (YMMV), then you add anywhere from $12K to $20K for guard/reserve participation to total a "workable" income.
I should preface that when I was making those numbers "troughing" in the Reserves, there were a fair amount of RPA/MPA trips that paid quite handsomely with high per-diem locales. Those trips have dried up lately so I know the LT's in my Sq are really hurting. Bumming/troughing used to imply you probably go TDY at least once a month on RPA/MPA in addition to a couple of AT days and your TP's/UTA's