Big airplanes “generally” pay more because they generate much more revenue per mile or hour. They can “afford” to pay more.
C172, B717 and a B777 all leave full from ATL-MCO. Assume each passenger paid the same for a ticket. Which pilot(s) had the most responsibility and therefore liability? Which could afford to pay more?
That being said, our smaller aircraft have a much higher pilot casm and pay rate relative to our larger aircraft. What about legs per day? Doesn’t matter as far as revenue generation. Just because somebody does ATL-BHM 5 times, doesn’t mean they flew more RASM than the guy who just did ATL-SEA. Since almost 100 percent of passengers on those shorter legs are connecting, accounting practices allocate much of the revenue to the longer leg.
Of course in the whole pilot pay area, we can split it however we want like seniority based pay. But, assuming current contract value it would bring down our top pay rate to about the 767 level. That is great for those 767 and lower, but bad for those 767 and higher as there is nothing left above them.
I know we can always expand the pie, but I am just trying to give a realistic example of what it would look like today.