Originally Posted by
UNDGUY
The point about the pay is very true. Larger aircraft should equal more pay, that is a no-brainer. But why can't we have the larger airplanes along with more pay at a regional. I really like the idea of the single pilot list too. Are there any airlines that do this? Allow you to just move from a regional to a major when you have the seniority without changing jobs. Why do the majors even contract out the regional flying? Why don't they just operate all of their own routes? I think instead of using the regionals as a 4-5 year stepping stone it would be much more beneficial to the employees and the employer if they just raised the standards and quality at regionals and retained employees for the long-term. Turnover costs companies lots of money that could be saved and put into better pay.
Wow. I hate it to say but you are seriously ignorant of airline economics and history. Its a little embarrassing to hear this stuff coming from a UND guy...
Here is why you can't have larger aircraft with better pay at a regional: that is whats known as a mainline carrier. Why not just have the regionals fly 737s and 757s? Because then you start competing with the mainline carriers. Scope clauses were meant to prevent this from happening. In the end this is better for all of us. Don't fool yourself, the regionals would love to get larger aircraft on property especially when they can pay regional pilots regional pay to fly it. Put this in your pipe and smoke it: the first DC-9s held a maximum of 90 pax. We are now flying 90 seat RJs for a fraction of what a DC-9 driver makes. But for whatever reason the DC-9 is considered a "mainline" aircraft while the RJ is an RJ.
The single pilot list was tried at several companies, most notably American/Eagle, USAirways/Piedmont and Continental/ExpressJet. Used to be when you got hired with ExpressJet you were hired with a Continental seniority number. When your number came up, you went over to Continental. This is great until things start to slide the other way. Ask the Eagle guys how great a flow-through agreement is.
The majors contract out regional flying because it is cheaper (dollars and cents, not necessarily "sense"). It can get REAL cheap when you start whipsawing your regional partners against each other. When United came to ACA and AWAC and wanted it done cheaper, ACA and AWAC said "no, if we do it cheaper we will be out of business" so United turned to Mesa, TSA and RAH who were willing to do the flying for less. Worked great for United (as far as cost goes. Customer service is another issue). We all know how it went for ACA. AWAC gambled on USAirways and it paid off, at least for now. ExpressJet used to be part of Continental but was spun off to raise money and to help lower costs by allowing other regionals to compete for CALs flying in the future. From the standpoint of the majors, they can lower their labor costs if the guy that moves into the right seat of a 737 is a newhire starting at year 1 pay. If it was one list and people flowed from regional to mainline, you are going to have to pay that guy 5th or 6th year pay.