Originally Posted by
gold
I'm on track to gross around 36K(including perdiem) for the initial 12 month period since DOH at PSA. It's certainly not great by no means but not as bad as some make it out to be. Breaking guarantee while on reserve and spending very little time on reserve certainly has helped. I average about $650/month in perdiem which includes initial training(paid 24/7 perdiem). My friends that started when I did are averaging about the same or better. It's reasonable for a line holder to credit 90-100 plus hours a month, even for someone junior. If you have any questions, feel free to PM me.
I don't like justifying the low pay. $36k is still not sufficient and too low. We shouldn't have to credit 100 hours just to pay the bills. 100 hours is probably getting you to about 9-11 days off max unless you're getting a lot of "Soft pay" which would still mean you're working your butt off every single month. Not just that, but you eventually depend on that 100 hours a month and the second your airline needs to start cutting back, you get displaced, etc, and your 100 hours is in danger of going down to min guarantee then you're screwed.
$36k your first year IS good for the regional environment today. However, we should not settle OR get into the habit of saying "$36k isn't too bad"...we can't get complacent!