Usair will retire roughly 50% of their pilots in the next 10 years. With a union the can negotiate better pay/benefits. They already have better retirement and insurance than JetBlue. More varied flying and real international flying. While the upgrade may be fast at JetBlue based on current retirements and expansion you may be on serve indefinitely. That is not a knock on the airline it's just the fact of a very young pilot group. The expansion is limited in that each new routes typically means reduced service in another city. For example DCA was heralded as growth when in reality is simply mean shifting flying from IAD.

Whether USair merges or not its still retiring massive amounts of pilots. 190 reserve for a career or potential 757,330 international?