Originally Posted by scottm

In India they had no minimums, and the airlines hired all the flight instructors from their schools, which shut down their schools. They have been trying to get them restarted with military instructors teaching volunteers, so far not much luck.

They don't have that many schools in India, so not really such a big deal, but the U.S. produces most of the world's new pilots. U.S. civilian flight schools are over 90% foreign students. Lowering ATP minimums would quickly empty flight schools of (minimum-wage) instructors the aviation industry badly needs.

U.S. airlines are certainly expecting the robust U.S. flight training pipeline will be available to pump out cheap pilots with newly-lowered training and experience standards, when they start calling this a "crisis". Foreign airlines and governments are building flight schools overseas, and have purchased some failing academies in the U.S., so that might eventually take some demand from U.S. schools, but we will need instructors.