Originally Posted by flynavyj

The airline lifestyle can be brutal at best. Many of my friends have always said "the flying is fun, the lifestyle is terrible." It'll extend from not seeing your families on holidays and birthdays, to not seeing your friends since you'll work weekends, and be off a couple days during the week. Friendships with other pilots tend to grow pretty well, especially if you're living in your domicile. If you have to commute, life will be worse than it typically is, you can expect to spend a couple extra days a month away from home because you start work to early in the morning, or finish to late in the evening to be able to make it back home. When you're doing that, the expense is on you, so find a cheap crew hotel, or a crashpad for a couple hundred a month, and have at it.

First year airline pay is pretty pathetic, you can look at the boards to see just how bad it is. Remember, we're paid for flight hour, limited to 100 hrs a month, and 1000 hrs a year. Some companies have different work rules as far as pay credit goes, which can help out. If your pay is 23/hr expect to make around 25k/yr, if it's 30-33, you can expect 35-40/yr, you'll make mid 40's at the better regionals that pay around 37/hr. Perdiem is on top of that, however, it's not part of your pay, and is used for expenses on the road, sometimes you can justify that it's in addition to your pay,but that all depends on how you live.

All in all, you won't know what it's like until you try it. I'd hate to tell your horror stories and scare you off, especially before you even got started. Same time, i wouldn't paint a bed of roses for you, and tell how you great things are, so you can be disappointed. I will venture though, that as far as pay goes, a cop, even in Florida, will make more than an airline pilot, at least for his first couple years. Things might equal out after that, and pilot pay will probably go up faster than police pay. I was making around 62k as a regional CA during my second year at the airline. I then got bumped back to an FO, making 35k/yr and am trying to get out of the industry. I wish you the best of luck, just be sure to look at everything from both sides...At this point, i'm really looking forward to playing some Microsoft Flight Sim, vs the real deal.