Originally Posted by
Roberto
That is what I have been trying to get across.
The other side of that coin is that the rates past year 7 could have been increased across the board to a greater amount. It wouldn't matter whether FO or CPT, both would have benefited. By increasing the pay for the first 7 years it arguably suppressed the raise for all the years later. In spite of the time value of money, I think most careers would have benefited by increasing pay more beyond year 7 and not so much in years 2-7.
I disagree with you Roberto. For the sake of our discussion though - let's say they gave you the option of either making the highest pay as a new hire with a gradually decreasing rates throughout your career or to keep the current rates where your pay increases with your seniority and seat advancements.
I bet you'd prefer to make $250K a year as a new hire even though you'd end up making only 33K during your last year... That way you could pay off your credit card bills, your mortgage, invest, etc, etc. "early" in your career... The gradually shrinking pay scale would be offset by your savings and great overall finances...
I think at regional airlines the captain pay is much more important because people move up to the left seat much sooner... At major airlines, such as UPS, AMR, DAL, FDX, etc I think it's better to focus on great FO rates (yes, I'm biased on this subject - just like you are) because often it takes literally several generation for us to upgrade. You going back to the left seat slowed down our upgrades even more which only proves my point...
I've never been on B&G - just curious, why did you post those retirement numbers for us anyways? Was it to cheer us up?
