Originally Posted by
Bluewaffle
Would someone explain the rationale from the company’s perspective for an early out? Why would they spend the money to pay you to leave Early when they can just furlough for much less cost? Is it all about good will and maintaining morale? Since there is very little flying and training costs are mostly fixed, I just don’t see it happening. I am encouraged to see just about every other airline offer one though
From a practical standpoint it can help mitigate the disaster of a training cascade as multiple pilots are shuffled down the hierarchy of categories. It's not so much of an immediate cost saving in a world where training centers are fixed costs and salaries are subsidized but by removing bodies from the displacements the end result is achieved quicker.
By moving bodies off both ends of the list there's much less churn in the middle.
But ultimately every airline is gonna do whatever burns the least cash in the short term and will come up with different solutions based on their circumstances.