Giving up six years of seniority at arguably the top legacy is a gamble, there's no two ways about it.

That being said...

Already living in SDF, you'll have a ton of options to find your niche as you build seniority but even being junior you should have some flexibility. My first few years here, reserve living in domicile was a really good deal. Things changed a bit both for me and the Company, so I went to morning turns to maximize home time and it worked out well. For others, airport "hot" standby works for them, for some its day flying, for some its shorter trips (base trip lines), for some its week on/off, for some its international...some bid seasonally, some bid depending on what their days off needs are.

Our retirement wave has been pulled forward some due to early retirements (which have been 2-3x mandatory the last few years) but we really hit that in earnest starting 2025 retiring triple digits a year and it runs for a decade. Fully 1/3 of our pilot group has been hired since Contract 2016 was ratified. Volume growing faster than hiring has caused short staffing, which causes schedules to be optimized, which combined with COVID nonsense causes pilots who are 60 and entitled to their defined benefit pension to retire early, which further exacerbates short staffing...and the snake has continued to eat its tail for a couple years now.

I'm sure you've seen the recent DALPA Contract Comparison that came out; our vacation and health insurance benefits are substantially better than Delta.

I've frequently said "this job ain't for everybody"...but it is a very good place to collect a check driving airplanes. Show up when you're supposed to show up, fly plane, collect banana, go home, forget about work while you're off. Based on what my friends at Southwest, American, United and even Delta say...we're all basically dealing with the same kinda crap from our employers, it just has different garnish.