Wage Fallacies
In several threads on this and the regional forums, I have seen the suggestion that the goverment step in and mandate that airlines not pay some absurdly low wage to highly trained, highly qualified airline first officers. Some have gone so far as to suggest a dollar amount as an "airline pilot minumum wage". From the offset, it may sound resonable.
In reality, most know that we have done it to ourselves. Quite simply, there exists too large a supply of pilots, not enough sustained demand, and the barriers to entry are too low. Obviously employers prefer to keep costs low, and the most controllable expense is business is payroll. They will lower wages to what they believe the market will bear. Some may tend to offer a slight premium in wage or benefits to boost interest, but since theoretically all pilots are homogenized to the same standards, it would be difficult to ensure that merely a wage increase would ensure the best talent.
Even more reason, some would cry, for the goverment to step in and create a price floor on the commodity of airline pilot. They argue that would give struggling but experienced/talented pilots incentive to remain in the industry. It would guarantee a "livable wage" (words of another poster who must not be alive). Obviously this increase in payroll expense would be passed along directly to the customer, either directly through price, or some form of "fair pay tax".
Perfect! they cry... what's a few extra dollars... I want to get paid! I'm worth it. Well, first every contract would have to be renogotiated.. and with new higher first year pay scales to match the guarantee, it would almost be certain that large structured pay increases would be a thing of the past, ($2 bump on $20 an hour is a 10% raise) a few percent a year at most, perhaps merit-based like every other employer, now that's scary. Of course, big daddy goverment may deem it necessary to step in from time to time and give a little bump to pay.
What about on the other end of the scale. Many banks have been demonized lately for paying out enormous bonuses to high level employees. These aren't just the highest level fat cats, but more junior execs who's salary is based off performance. Ok, so the bank must not have been performing that well if they needed bailout money... but two points 1) Many of those junior execs work for very profitable sections of the bank, and 2) they had abosolutely no say, vote, influence what-so-ever in deciding whether that bank accepted federal bailout. Still bonuses anger the taxpayers, and politicians concerned about votes step in with threats of bonus (read: salary) caps.
My point is, if we allow the government to step in and mandate how much we get paid on the bottom end, what is to stop them from doing the same on the upper end? If they can bypass contract language and re-establish low end pay, why not upper end as well? When you allow the goverment to control your wages, you allow politics and knee-jerk lynch mob mentality to control it as well. Airline in chapter 11? Uncle Sam steps in and cuts your wage to help make the company solvent... or sets a cap on what you can possible earn. What about the next Buffalo, the next Atlanta/MSP, or some other incident? Public opinion sways politician's vote on what you are worth.
Maybe that sounds a little too far fetched of a conspiracy theory for some of you, but I am willing to accept that there will be a lower low end to pilot pay scales than to openly allow goverment to determine what pilots are worth. They already control enough of my wage through taxes.