Well great, pretty sure a "call to arms" and a "legislative alert" was the last thing that happened right before we went from 60-65.....

Of course then the unions were against it right until it looked imminent than they were for it so they could "steer" it as they said....

 

I don’t think so. Maybe it’s just the dementia of old age, but if I remember right there was no call to arms, the *****s in DC snuck it in in the middle of the night.

 

Make no mistake, this will definitely cause stagnation at the Legacies. I don't think hiring will come to a full stop but going from hiring 2000 a year down to 500 is not out of the question.

Almost every NB CA I've flown with has said if the age was raised they would continue flying. Reasons given are the wife would want them to, they have too many financial obligations, they didn't adequately save up for retirement (a lot of those people lost their pensions), and the new contract pay raises are just too much to walk away from and want to realize at least a couple years of that earning potential.

 

Every NB captain I’ve flown with has said the opposite.

 

who cares what they say? What matters is what they do, and 95% of AA pilots that stay until 65 now, will stay until they turn 67 or 68 too. And by the way, about 95% of AA Pilots who retired so far in 2023, were age 65 mandatory retirements. Over 90% were age 65 in 2022 as well.

knowing AA they will stop hiring completely until 6 months prior to the new mandatory retirement date. AA is too scared of being ahead of any kind of trend in the industry, especially hiring trends. Only hiring AA will do is to cover for any aircraft deliveries that may or may not get delivered from Boeing or Airbus.

 

Fingers crossed it ain’t happening.

 

I bet you, 90% plus will do it.

 

Most likely. Foolish really, but to each his own. My assumption is that by the time you get to 65, you are senior enough to drop your whole schedule, pick up one or two premium trips and use sick time when needed. You could get away with flying once a month if you had to and still make about a half million bucks a year with profit sharing and 401k. That's another million dollars earned in two years. How many people on this planet have that opportunity? Would I do it? I don't know, but I am planning for 60. I've got a military pension kicking in at 58 years old that's going to pay me $75,000 a year so that's worth $1.5M in the bank at a 5% withdrawal. How much money do you possibly need? You can't take it with you when you die and I definitely don't plan on leaving my spoiled kids that kind of money so they think they don't have to work hard for what they earn.

 

that’s my plan for my later years but don’t think you’ll get anywhere near 500k flying 1-2 premium trips a month. Profit sharing numbers are based off how much you work…

 

Maybe my math is wrong, but....with 1,000 hours of sick in the bank, you could take 40 hours of sick per month for 2 years. With 100% premium, two 3-day trips could be worth 60+ hours. That gets you to 100 hours. With next year's pay tables, that's near $500k for a NB CA with 17% 401k contribution at $350+ an hour. If it can be done, someone will figure it out. It amazes me how much brain power people put into working the system.