Originally Posted by Albief15

Guys hired in 2007 can hold NB captain at Delta (JFK). Guys hired in 2007 at FedEx are bottom 300, or 7%, and mostly on right seat of 757 and hub turning.

If I could be "anyone", who would not want to be an 88, 94-98 hire at FedEx? Those guys did well because they caught a rising tide. Guys hired at SWA in the early 90s had a similar ride. I was late to the party in 2002 as part of the postal hiring, but its been a very nice ride for me as well.

The up and down cycles in the pax industry won't go away. But in the early 90s, there were a handful of legacies carriers. Eastern failed, as did TWA. Pan Am died. Now there are basically 3 major carriers.

There is always a downside risk, but the risk is much smaller than it was in past decades. Additionally, since the legacies have moved to DC plans, there is less risk to your retirement. If you company fails--it stinks--and you are on the street again looking for work. What is different now is that you will be on the street with whatever you have saved in your 401k plus your 16-18% B fund. It sucks--but it sucks less than the guys who lost pensions in the early 2000s or lost their companies in the 1990s.

I think FedEx is a great career for the right person. However, there is a tendency, especially among guys who caught the wave at the right time, to assume anyone else who joins that company will have similar advancement. FedEx wasn't everyone's first choice in the 90s, but for the guys who looked ahead and got hired here it worked out pretty well. Delta, American, etc were the darlings of 1999. Then we had 9/11. SWA was everyone's favorite in the early 2000s, as were we. Nobody wanted to be at a legacy anymore. Point is guys hired in the 90s at both SWA and FedEx did well. Guys who joined SWA and FDX in the 2000s--the only games really hiring--have ended up in companies with much slower advancement. The checks clear, the companies are strong, and its doesn't suck to work at either place.

The thing is, when you start to poo-poo the legacies, IMHO you sound like the same voices over there that wondered why anyone would come to FedEx or SWA when they could be there instead. The industry has become inverted again, with Delta hiring pilots in the late 2000s while UPS was furloughing them. Assuming that just because Fedex was THE place to be in 1995, or even 2000, that it will always be a better opportunity is pretty short sighted. We've gotten the postal contract 3 times, and I am very grateful for the security, day flying, and extra pilots it requires. We got 5 more years on this round. Will it come back? What would the impact be to hiring, advancement, and Q of life is we miss the getting it renewed? How likely is that? Probably no more or less likely than one of the big 3 airlines going under in the next 15 years...

My fear is not another 9/11. My fear is the suit that will replace Fred Smith when that transition finally occurs at some point in the future. We've had a great couple decades. I can skate to the finish. If I had 20-30 years to go I would really, really weigh my choices.

When I got here, I always heard, enjoyed, and repeated the mantras I heard: "Boxes don't *****", and "The boxes always keep moving..." The corollary that we've learned watching UPS is "boxes don't complain if they take 1 night, or two weeks to get to the destination..." People will always fly. We are not going to take trains to the west coast, or accept steaming on a ship for a week to get to London. There will be cycles up and down, and it won't be linear. But shippers are finding other ways to move goods (mode shift), and both UPS and FedEx have scope issues (FedEx--external--UPS--internal with NURPs). We now put some of our cargo not the bellies of pax carriers--something very new in our business model. Those Asia bound 777s at American and Delta can hold a 757's worth of cargo in their belly alone. Sitting around and saying "I made 300k for a decade here--you will too" may be the truth. But we aren't recession proof, nor are we the only way to move goods in the 21st century. I think both Delta and FedEx will be around for decades to come, and both probably successful. I do not, however, think that we have some kind of cosmic voodoo that keeps us from experiencing downturns, and when you are making a choice that involves decades of your life you should move with your eyes open to all the possiblities.