Originally Posted by
KC135
I see what you're saying now, I didn't include past numbers. I assumed you meant retirements going forward since you were talking about depleting regionals at the levels today. I added southwest for about 12,400 in the next 6 years.
Not up to date but here's an estimate.
It seems to me that the vast majority of pilots, especially those with the less than ideal jobs, have a very rosy picture of airline retirements and their future job prospects in their heads. Here's the answer to your questions.... MONEY.... it will never be easy to get a good airline job... never. Every time these stats and data come up there is huge sets of numerical data missing... huge sets.
1. new pilots coming out of flight school each year to replenish the regional fleet. I don't know the number but I'd bet anything it's more than a few hundred (nation wide).
2. Military! here's your biggest threat/competitor... Military guys rarely seem to wait at most 2 years for a call from one of the major 3; delta's hiring is more than 70% military (give or take a few precent... got that from an email their union sent out about 8 months ago). A decent estimate of military guys ready to look for commercial jobs each year is around 700 (no great source on that, but it's a conservative estimate).
3. flows. this isn't replenishing the regionals obviously, but I believe american is basically locked up on hiring until about 2030 with flows, off the street hiring not to exceed more than about 100 per year, and mostly will be military. This was from a rep at a job fair, nothing concrete. United will begin flowing 30-40% of their new hires in the next year or so from a variety of regionals
4. As was mentioned... 135, 91, and international guys returning home. This is a MASSIVE number. Obviously I have no good count, but the number of 91 and 135 pilots who are less than thrilled with their gig has got to be in the thousands, easily.
I've got no real concrete numbers to back this all up, but it's just logic... just things that are often neglected to be said when we talk about this pilot shortage. Good jobs will never be short pilots, and they will always be competitive to obtain. Economics 101. Ask around to regional captains as to how long they've been waiting to get on at united. There's thousands of these guys waiting patiently.
As long as Allegiant stays a better place to work than the bottom 1/3 of the pack (which they will), I don't ever see them having too much trouble on staffing. This is not to say they we will get good candidates or a lot of them, we won't, but guys with pulses and an ATP will suffice.
Paint the picture bleak, and be pleasantly surprised when it brightens up
-Alex-