I can totally see how my comment came off kinda Dunning-Krugerish, and that’s my fault for poor wording. I didn’t mean to come off like I was telling current and more senior employees what they clearly already knew.

I have honestly benefited from Margaritaville’s hard truths as I read this forum for a couple years waiting for a seat. I knew what I was getting into, and for me it was still worth taking the job and slugging it out for a while with an optimistic outlook.

Thanks to these posts, I was prepared for years of reserve in FL getting LL’ed around, and I financially prepared for the time it would take for me to even get to that level of comfort. I knew I would likely not upgrade for a decade+. But it’s where I wanted to live, and it was still escaping a regional.

What I was NOT prepared for, was FL housing prices to rise so much in one year that min guarantee on FO reserve pay was a legitimate concern. A modest 3/2 would cost half my pay on years 2-? as an FO. And while I knew with premium pay I would likely make more, I didn’t want to depend on it, and I didn’t want to worry about whether it would be paid correctly or not. Meanwhile my buddies at every other major made $150-200k as FOs with minimal or no extra effort.

With everyone hiring, and everyone paying more, it largely was a financial decision for me. If the pay was on par with other majors, it would’ve made the other hard parts easier to swallow. But I didn’t want to worry about making enough money while also dealing with the difficult work rules.

I still feel grateful for the experience, as I met a lot of great folks, and it allowed me to be more competitive at other airlines. And G4 got some cheap labor out of me 😆. I hate to sound salty. This job is indeed very nice for some, but it could easily be the best 121 job for most with a very little bit of improvement and culture shift.