Yes, year one at a legacy from a captain at Breeze will be a pay cut, that’s a known fact. But if you’re attempting to convince yourself that somehow sacrificing that one year won’t earn you way more in later years, you’re wrong. Unless maybe you are 63 years old and don’t have time.

But if you just compare apples-to-apples. Year 2 legacy narrowbody rates starting January ‘25 are $185. Year 3 starting January ‘26 are $225. Now factor in 17% for retirement!! When you do that math, the legacy FO makes about $1k more than the Breeze year 3 E195 CA, or year 1 A220 CA.

Year 2: A220 CA vs NB FO
237x85x12=$241,740 +6% match= $14,504
185x85x12=$188,700 +17%=$32,079

Year 3: I’ll use year 4 Breeze CA pay for this one and year 3 NB CA at reserve min guarantee

243x85x12=$247,860+6% match= $14,871

363.66x76x12=$331,657+ (18% now!) 18%=$59,698

so by year 3, and on reserve, a legacy CA makes over 130k more PER YEAR than a line holding Breeze CA. Not including any per diem or any form of other compensation. Not only is their compensation higher, but they have contracts that dictate what can and can not happen to you!! This is a very simple ROI problem. Is a 2/3 year wait enough for you to jump ship because you know you’ll be making more by then than Breeze will ever pay, or do you slug it out and hope that Breeze middle management agrees to the best LCC contract to ever exist, which would still be lower than a legacy! The decision is yours to make. Anyone under 50 years old staying at Breeze seriously makes me wonder about their mental health! Luckily for me I earned my golden ticket and my class date is approaching!

 

Widebody isn’t just good for those who want to fly widebodies. It makes all the narrowbody relative seniority that much better in both NB seats. The biggest fallacy I hear from LCC/ULCC pilots is they don’t have any desire to fly WBs so no reason to leave. I used to have that same mentality until I realized how it helps every other seniority bucket. My buddy who left frontier (reluctantly—I had to convince him pretty hard) for United, with that same attitude about only wanting to ever fly Airbus NB and how it would be the same as what he’s doing at frontier so he didn’t want to go and take a pay cut, is now on the 787. He now will never go back to narrowbody. And even when he was on the 320 at UAL he couldn’t believe he even entertained staying at frontier instead. But I digress.

But back to your argument. Just look at 401k. $50-$60k a year direct contribution in a 401k, compounding, is the biggest differentiator in a career at a major and a career at breeze.

And if you think that will get much better, just remember how Neeleman envisioned this airline. Fly airplanes in-between RJs and majors. Pay in-between RJ pay and major pay. Hire CFIs…as in, if regionals can attract pilots and pay them dog poo, he can have slightly bigger planes, pay them slightly better than dog poo, and attract from the same pool as regionals. After 2 years or so they can upgrade. After 2 or so years in the left seat they can move on to majors. And now he just resets the average longevity and gets someone new on 1st year pay to replace the guy on 5th year pay. Rinse, repeat.

He did the same thing with FAs…make them “part time” young college girls, pay them crap, they get a 4 year degree and then go get a real job/career. Then they get a new part time college student to replace them. Keeps them young and paid low….which honestly is genius. The experienced jaded FAs are often the worst.

Point is he found a way to try to perpetually keep pay down by resetting longevity. Keeping the average pilot at 2-5 years longevity instead of having hundreds or thousands of guys who will end up maxing out at 12 years, with more sick/vacation time, is smart from a business standpoint. Theres a reason when he was giving raises he didn’t really come close with 401k. He still doesn’t want you to stay there for long. He did what he had to do to get and keep enough meat in the seat, but once this pilot market cools off (it already has started), his plan will go back in place, and if you think you’ll get a CBA and a good retirement anytime soon, you’re nuts. They want their 401k to be like regionals’…crappy. Because they want their pilots to be like most regional pilots…just trying to build time and get to a career airline.

But, there’s other reasons staying at breeze might be cool (I almost went there very early on). I just don’t think fear of a pay cut going to a major is one of them. And I’d much rather be at the bottom of a major seniority list right now, with a bunch of retirements on the horizon, than anywhere on the list at a startup that still is hemorrhaging money and not close to breaking even, with no end in sight. I just don’t see a very viable path for Breeze aside from being bought, which I know is the hope for many breeze guys. Nothing wrong with that, just a huge gamble, while losing opportunity cost with pay, 401k and seniority at a much more sure bet with a much more predictable and stable future. Hope is a strong emotion though. Sometimes stronger than logic. Just my $.02.

 

what he said 👆🏻. Sums it up perfectly. I still remember the breezenomics episode where Trent said , “we’re a regional Plus” . Like we were supposed to be proud of that.

 

Well what do you expect from the guy in charge of the money. The moment attrition went through the roof they raised pay. They told us we’re looking to be at break even or profitable in the next 6 months, possibly sooner. Past that, who knows. The type of airline they’ve created or would like to have is totally different than others. Somewhat close to Southwest maybe as far as point to point. We’re still very small, unless someone wants our order book of up to 120 A220s.

 

“They told us we’re looking to be at break even or profitable in the next 6 months”.

Of course they told you that. The actual profitability date has moved so many times it’s made my head spin!! Breeze is flying government subsidized routes that no other airline wants to fly!! They’re all on contract with certain cities, as soon as the contract ends, we cut the route and add another one that nobody else wants to fly. We aren’t flying some unique, never before heard of airline. We are just reopening up routes that were dropped by low cost airlines in the 80s-90s.
The faster you realize that our management is just lying to everyone to keep the place staffed the better. Stay if you really believe, or go if you believe you’re career is worth more than what Trent Porter is going to offer you!!

 

Spot on.

You can keep preaching this all day long, but the majority of pilots (captains) at MX have already given up on a career at the majors. They've become stuck making 2x-3x what they made previously - all while flying 2 leg days on an A220. They ain't leaving. They are comfortable. And most can't get hired elsewhere anyway.

To the young FOs - do not let these captains convince you that this is the best place to be. "Just imagine where JetBlue was 20 years ago".... stop. Just stop. As mentioned very well above, Breeze is a great first job, but it is not a long term job. Just as Breeze is changing on each bid, theres nothing saying it won't for the worse at any time. There is no guarantee Tampa, Charleston, Provo, etc... will be bases forever. In fact, it's likely they won't be.

 

Ok except it’s the same 3 or 4 on here that have been saying the same thing for hundreds of pages now. Not very impressive. Probably unhappy with their situation, most likely messed up their legacy interview and have been stuck and now have too much seniority to leave. Except for one that pulled a 180 as soon as he decided he’s leaving, so now breeze must suck for everyone. The reality though is that seniority numbers haven’t changed much, people are staying and trying to make it better, and as far as the FOs, they’re not dumb, they know exactly what to do, they’re not listening to their CAs for advice. If you came here for the wrong reasons then it’s going to be hard to stay. Either way, best of luck nobody is forcing you to stay. Like they say, you won’t know if you made the right decisions until you’re setting the parking brake for the last time.

 

I just saw this post but I have not read all posts. Sorry if this hasn't been commented.

This argument is spot on, and the difference increases if you do CA vs CA pay.

To all this I'd add the upgrade at majors are getting reall quicker that they used to be, so there is bigger chance to catch up and surpass regional income sooner.

Another factors that they are hard to quantify are the soft pay like international override and perdiem.

United even pays dry cleaning, among other stuff. And I am sure the insurance may be better at mainline.

And if you are a cheap bastard like me, I'd take crew meals into account. Yeah , they many not be best, but definely you save a few dollars/day there too.

 

How do some of ya'll get up in the morning? At Breeze I make a 1/4 mil a year working on average 3 days a week, and many weeks just 2, and I don't have to commute to some ugly hub city. 401k isn't where it oughta be yet but it's probaly going to become at least acceptable. If it doesn't, then I've made plans for that too.

I get awarded 19-21 days off consistently, 16-17 on the odd slow month, which is hard to beat...it's worth more than gold to me .I'm sure things are *better* elsewhere, but this gig doesn't suck. Unless your goal is to have a really fancy funeral one day or become the fountainhead for your progeny, it's become a fine place to hang your hat, despite what the orginal plan may have been.

 

Sir you have perfectly described the average mentality of Breeze pilots and reason we will never see improvements. You could work 👌 much more at a Legacy and make 400k a year with work rules and retirement policies!!