I'm sorry this post may get a little long. I want to address some of the questions raised in this thread.

Mason, I respect your challenges. However, I'm sorry, I still don't agree with you. I will attempt to explain why in a moment.

The FAA pilot database is really a database of certificates. There are many more certificates in the database than just pilots. There are a total of 1,004,229 certificates in the database today. Only 645,301 of them are pilot certificates (student, sport, recreational, private, commercial, and ATP). For example there are 288,486 A&P certificates (some of which also hold pilot certificates), 32,433 Control Tower Operator certificates, 17,016 Dispatchers, and even 6,642 Parachute Rigger certificates.

The database also contains many pilots with foreign addresses, ie foreign pilots. Yes you can search by them and break them out. For example there are 85,461 “European” pilots, which include pilots from not only continental Europe, but also countries like India (5,813) or Pakistan (116) or Kuwait (57). There are pilots from China (1908), Korea (812), Japan (3759), and Mexico (2493). Their addresses are the addresses they used when they obtained their medical certificates or updated their address with the FAA. If they used a foreign address, I excluded them from the numbers I pulled. If they used a USA address, then they would be included.

Data can be pulled by certificate type and class level medical expiration. For example, there were 1566 student pilot certificates with USA addresses with 1st class medical expiration dates in 2010 and 3519 student pilot certificates with USA addresses with 1st class medical expiration dates in 2009, for a total of 5085. I suspect strongly this group are the recent new pilot starts that fancy themselves someday being a professional pilot. That total is also down by more than half, consistent with what we see in the flight school training industry today. Again history has shown that less than 10% complete the required certificates and ratings.

The certificate database is also about three to four months behind in updates. So the numbers pulled today really represent the picture in May or June of this year. The numbers I pulled in January 2008 really represent the picture in August or so of 2007.

Mason, the reasons I don't agree with your point-of-view are I believe most airline pilots keep and hold a first class medical. They may only get it once a year as an FO, but they still get first class's. I think in most cases their company requires it, because the company wants to make sure they stay captain ready. I'm sure all major's require it, and based on the posts here, I think most regionals require it. If you fly international, even to Mexico or Canada, I know ICAO regulations require it.

You think there are a lot of regional airline FO's that don't obtain new first class medicals once a year, but get second classes, and therefor I have missed them in my count. By the data listed in APC, there are 21,009 pilots I have listed as regional, and yes I include the regional “majors” in that list. 90% of those pilots work for American Eagle, SkyWest, ExpressJet, Republic, ASA, Mesa, Pinnacle, Comair, Mesaba, Air Wisconsin, Horizon, PSA, Peidmont, and Colgan. Based on the responses in this thread I think it's safe to say most require the 1st class. That leaves 2095 pilots that work for the rest (Lynx, Great Lakes, Cape Air, etc.). Roughly half of those pilots would be FO's. That amounts to 1047 or so pilots. And I still suspect most of those get 1st class medicals at least once a year.

The second reason is more important. While the total pilot pool numbers are interesting and to a certain extent debatable, I did not include CMEL's with an instrument rating and a 2nd class physical in the January 2008 data. I want to compare “apples to apples” because I am most interested in the change, the delta, that may have taken place in the last two years of essentially no hiring, than the exact total number.

I define a pilot shortage as management having to spend money and change their hiring practices because they find themselves unable to fill their classes. In 2007 and early 2008 we certainly had strong signs of that condition at the regional hiring level. Recruiting Reps at many airlines were crisscrossing the country (spending money) establishing “preferential hiring” relationships with flight schools. Management was offering bonuses and bounties (spending money), increasing pay rates and training salaries (spending money), and putting in two to six week pre-hire courses (I was personally involved with one at a smaller regional that had a $500,000 annual budget). Minimum hiring experience in some cases was at commercial mins. In some cases regional management was going to their major airline partners and asking them to stop hiring their pilots – they were struggling to meet their contracts for departures. Managements were going to their pilot unions and negotiating side letters to let them promote out of seniority order because they were running out of captains that met insurance mins. Management wasn't doing those things out of the kindness of their heart.

So when I look at the pilot data from January 2008 which reflects a time when the above shortages were occurring and I look again at the pilot data today, I don't see an appreciable difference. In fact the argument can be made that there are potentially even less pilots available. There is no growth in the pool of certificate qualified pilots, no large group appears to be in training (new starts are down almost 60%), flight schools are failing or turning to foreign training contracts to survive, the major financiers of flight training (Key Bank and Wells Fargo) are no longer in the business, and the cost of obtaining the necessary certificates, ratings, and experience ($35,000 to $80,000 and continuing to climb) is still a very strong barrier for most to cross without help. It appears the conditions which lead to a shortage pilots at the regional level still exist. The certificate database reflects this.

A poster stated I had no agenda. I appreciate the comment, but I do have a small one. I want people to understand the number of pilots we are taking about. The entire group of active and available airline pilots wouldn't fill Jerry's new dome in Arlington, TX. We would have elbow room. 90% of the available pool is employed and working. They may not be in the job they want forever, but they are pulling in a paycheck. We are the supply side of the supply and demand equation. It's important that we understand the size of the supply if we are to negotiate effectively with management. We have to understand that the “supply”, us, is smaller, getting smaller, and not being replenished. Many posters on this site talk about “taking back the profession”. We may have a time rapidly approaching when airlines are looking to hire relatively large amounts of qualified pilots again. Understanding this data will make us tougher and more able to negotiate significant improvements at our airlines. It is an opportunity we haven't seen in a while.

Will we be ready to take it?