No one ever said 36K was a lot of money, it's not. Gold was just pointing out he's on track to gross that amount his first year. I read through his comments and he was not trying boast or state his opinion for that matter. I have a friend that went to skywest, during training he received 60 hours a month at $22/hr with no per diem and shared a hotel room. After training he spent the next 10 months on reserve not breaking guarantee and not flying a lot so not much per diem. He showed me what he made for that first twelve months, including perdiem it was 24K. If anything, what gold posted is more a comparison to other regionals first year pay.