Originally Posted by
akulahunter
OK, at some point I believe we have forgotten we live in a capitalistic society... Regional pay will not be much higher anytime soon. Why would it be? There are too many pilots willing to work for what the regionals are paying, because there is the hope of making it to mainline. It's simple economics. Most of the people on this forum (and hopefully me soon as well) are flying in the regionals and knew what the pay was before accepting the job offer. Why? Because mainline carriers pay a ton more!
No matter how many regionals vote NO, there will always be another carrier (even a new one) that will fly for these wages. To be perfectly honest, do you really think that the mainlines couldn't find a whole new set of pilots willing to work for $150k/year. Be serious... Its a losing proposition that started way before most of us even started thinking of flying commercially.
The bottom line is that there are 12,000 pilots willing to work for regional pay right now and there always will be as long as the mainlines are paying so much more. Regionals will never be unified and even if they were, it would be incentive for someone to establish a new regional with lower wages.
There is nothing wrong with making the regionals a career, but realize there is never going to be an incentive for the mainlines to pay more. The die is cast.
There would be "an incentive for mainlines to pay more" if you and others that are trying to get into the regionals, would refuse to consider employment at the worst regionals(especially the ones that just voted in concessions during a time of record profits)! If they couldn't staff at the bottom feeders then they would have no choice but to offer better pay and benefits to keep the A/C flying!