Originally Posted by
wankel7
Here is what scares me the most about NetJets. At your 11 years of seniority how many people are behind you ? 250?
If the fractional industry hits wake turbulence from a landing butterfly you are on the street. I know NetJets keeps saying they are not growing because they are preparing for the next downturn but 250 pilots to the street sure will help the bottom line in a downturn.
And that is why being a junior 11 year FO is scary. I am not saying that wouldn't happen at an airline but having a few thousand behind you could be helpful if it works out.
This industry sucks, we all know it, not one segment is more safe than others. The blind cheerleaders like to say NetJets is impervious to economic fluctuations, completely ignoring the fact that they furloughed 500 people less than a decade ago, and finished recalling them 2 years ago.
That being said, compare starting at an airline versus starting at NetJets, and being put on the street at year 11, your earnings, retirement, company stock ownership, performance bonuses etc at a legacy would literally be millions more. Sure you are more vulnerable at Netjets because you will not move up that seniority list. There is no growth and they are actively shrinking the fleet size and pilot group, which is why they won't hire for the rest of this year, and probably won't for the first quarter of 2018 by the looks of it.
You can measure where you will be on the seniority list if a major airline hires you. You know where you will retire at on that list. With no growth, Netjets will not have movement, even if an age 65 rule comes along, as a new hire it really won't have much of an impact.
Preparing for the next downturn is very smart but the real issue is that the company model is not sustainable. The only reason NJA has turned profit is because they paid their loan to BK off. NJA doesn't have the capital to make a large aircraft order to expand, and they can't even use their fleet as collateral because NJA doesn't own them. Without uncle Warren's pocket book, you won't ever see any big moves from NJA in terms of growth.