Originally Posted by
Halon1211
I’m kind of in the same boat as you as far as being at Spirit,
about to hit the submit button to American, kinda eyeballing United not sure.
somebody else asked earlier what drove you to want to leave Spirit. and the simple truth is, it’s just a realization that there’s really no more growth with ULCC’s especially if the stupid governments gonna block this merger.
I really didn’t want to leave.. I really enjoy it here, easy job I feel like I get paid a lot of money. Sometimes, I feel like there’s just kind of something missing. Like an incomplete puzzle to me..
been deciding if that is really worth it to leave and it’s a close call, but I think in the end it needs to happen.
Some things become a self fulfilling prophecy. Junior attrition was a problem even before the failure of the merger and the P&W engine problems. And with the hiring wave continuing apace in the legacies (UA is now giving out NB CA slots in intro, and they are going junior - indeed, some of their most junior are being forced into them if they have the requisite 121 time) that may well move up into more of our junior CAs who are looking at years of stagnation anyway and realistically, if furloughs happen might well be seeing downgrades. And that alone may FORCE the more junior FOs (who have little seniority to lose anyway) to start looking for elsewhere to go. No doubt P&W will be required to try to make the company whole economically for the downtime but that's still flying that isn't happening and little inducement to stay. It's also clear that it didn't take NK to go to JetBlue to undercut the ULCC model, the Big Three are now doing that quite effectively with their "basic economy" fares today.
If the attrition becomes great enough, or if the out of service aircraft become great enough to furlough/downgrade, the loss of pilots in this hiring environment could well cause a death spiral into bankruptcy.
Smooth move, judge...