Originally Posted by
firefighterplt
Purely anecdotal, but those guys tend to be older, families/larger families, kids approaching/in college, more expenses. I also have some acquaintances who made it to the majors and started to get a taste of that big airline pilot money—and began to live accordingly. They seem to be sweating it more than the guys who decided to live more sensibly and build up a solid emergency fund—and they’re certainly panicking more than my buddies who are regional new hires.
It’s typically easier for a junior regional FO to adapt to UI or a lower paying job, plus youth does make it less terrifying to transition to a new/second career. I can only speak for myself in that regard, though.
Yeah, that's about right. Me personally, at this point in life I would not be happy if I had to transition back to the white-collar management grind. I'd be OK with a low-key office job but my resume screams leadership so I'd be overqualified for spreadsheet-filler jobs. Maybe try to get programming work... ideally work from home, they just tend to care that you can code, less worried about organization fit, over-qualification, etc.
We aren't very far out on the financial limb, so no big rush if it comes to that. Probably a good idea to keep the lifestyle somewhat modest for your first 3-4 years at a major, build the emergency find. That way if something happens you're not in a panic to shed expenses/debt, and you have a pile of cash to see you through. Or have a plan (and be mentally prepared) to rapidly shed overhead and luxuries.