Originally Posted by
PhantomHawk
I saw it for MANY years, and I respectfully disagree with your respectful disagreement. When I was hired at XJT, it was one of the “places to be”. It was XJT, Air Wisconsin, and Comair. Today, the two that survived are dumpster fires. The places that SUCKED were Pinnacle and PSA. Pinnacle is now Endeavor and pays the best, and everyone I know that went to PSA has been an American pilot for years now. There’s a cycle, and I WOULD say that it’s XJT’s turn to spring back and be a great place.......except it seems that the exploitation went too deep. You have to feed the cow in order to milk it. The NUMEROUS inept management teams over the years did nothing but milk, and never fed. I hope it works out for y’all, but I used to think we were “better than the others”, and that it would pay off for us. Guess what.......you aren’t, and it hasn’t. Not trying to sound like a dick, I’m trying to say that there’s a perception when you’re inside the trap, that the trap is going to get better.....because you deserve it. It doesn’t work that way.
The very fact Pinnacle (dba Endeavor) went from worst to first is proof of my point. The same could be said for my regional (Republic).
There's no sense of entitlement on my end. I believe all regional pilots should be paid more than they are, and I don't believe one group is inherently better or more deserving than another. But the simple reality is that when compared to one another, there are monumental differences between the best of the bunch (Endeavor, Republic) and the worst (TSA, GoJet, Mesa).
It is cyclical, and there's certainly an element of truth to the notion that as one pilot group improves their contract, it makes it easier for the airline to be undercut by others who haven't gotten the improvements.
Nevertheless, a rising tide lifts all ships, and that's exactly what we've seen over the last decade. It's all supply and demand. The demand for pilots has increased, and in order to be competitive, the various regionals have had to make themselves more marketable. It's a far cry from the late Oughts and early 2010s in the regional world.
Over the last 5 or so years, the regionals have segregated into those that been able to retain pilots well and those that haven't. Those that have kept their performance metrics up and grown as a result. While I readily concede that cost is the most important factor in the regionals, if it were the only one Mesa would rule the world.