Originally Posted by Chowdah

I doubt the poster you were responding to was a neuroscientist, but obviously, yes, there’s been a lot of research done about cognitive decline with age. So the question is, where do we put the mandatory retirement age? I agree with others that some of us are perfectly sharp at 65, but there are plenty who are in obvious decline at 65 as well. As someone who used to do simulator work and more than my share of line checks over the years, I can assure you that pilot “Joe Smith” at 65 is not as sharp as he was at 55. This becomes very evident when stress is introduced. How far do we want to let this trend go, rolling the dice that the medical exam and CQ events catch an issue before a pilot is out in a situation that requires more cognitive power than they have available? I definitely started noticing in my 40s that after a bad night sleep, or especially grueling backside of the clock flight or perhaps just life stress, there were days that I was very glad I did not face a challengeing emergency. I think most of us have enough SA to see that when we were younger, these things just didn’t affect us as much…

As someone who is currently sitting in my desired seat, this would be quite beneficial to me financially. Two more years of making 450 K a year and two less year drawing from retirement account… And yet I’m pretty skeptical. I just can’t see an argument from the pilot side other than the financial one.