First and foremost, finish your degree. No flight department (airline, corporate or other) that I know of requires an aviation degree. Many do, however, require a 4 year degree. As others have mentioned it will also be a valuable plan B in the unfortunate event you find yourself furloughed, unable to maintain a medical, etc. It may also be a good way to finance your way through accumulating hours or perhaps be something that can supplement your income on days off. Many airline pilots have pursuits outside aviation that can be more profitable than being a pilot.

There are pitfalls to any career. One of the most common you see in aviation is the massive debt. If you can avoid it, do so. Spending a couple extra years getting to your goal sounds far better to me than being a slave to debtors. It's taken me almost 10 years after graduating, and leaving the cockpit to not live paycheck to paycheck.

Rule to live by
 

Those who have a viable means of getting out of aviation eventually will. People who only have an aviation degree and pilot experience in their resume are stuck for life.

Have you ever seen what happens to lifer pilots when they retire or medical out? Well it is not pretty. Think blue vest.

Skyhigh

The only thing worse than being on the outside looking in is being a full time working pilot and wishing that you weren't.

Modern Trajectory of a pilot
 

In the past a pilot could expect to get a job with a stable major airline in their 20's and retire with a full retirement check to come in the mail from 60 on. Flight training was cheaper and the military wanted only 4 years of your life if you were to join and be trained as a pilot. Once gainfully employed as an airline pilot your wages steadily climbed into the upper class.

Consider the situation today: College and flight training costs are pushing 200K, the military wants 10 to 20 years, wages have been cut in half and retirements are gone. Add to that that the 1500 hour rule and steep competition at the majors and one would be lucky to even be able to fill out an application for a major while still in their 30's.

The whole situation is a recipe for financial and personal life disaster. Start out deep in the hole burdened with loans facing a massively uphill battle and placing most of your faith into the hands of luck and circumstance. Not much room for personal relationships. Little hope of home ownership. Always wondering if your company is on the verge of, bankruptcy, merger, downsizing or liquidation.

Almost guaranteed to retire broke (or worse in debt) with no hope for rescue.

Skyhigh
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I don't want to contribute too much to the negativity, but something I've been thinking about for the last few years is:

In the past, 1950s, 60s, 70s, 80s and 90s, the military has really provided the pilots for the major airlines. It doesn't mean that ALL of them are prior military pilots, but a good percentage are and the further back you go, the higher the percentage is I'd assume. The whole "go to college, work as a flight instructor, work as a regional pilot, get to the majors"-thing was never the way it worked. This is a recent development and those pilots and the industry are still trying to figure out if this can even work. That constant trickle of military pilots always filled every need the airlines had, highly disciplined, taught good skills, able to survive on first year FO pay and no debt, turbine experience, often experience flying large aircraft, teamwork, etc. it doesn't matter if someone has 5000hrs because they spent 7 years as an instructor and regional pilot, that 1000hr military guy was what the majors wanted. The reason schools like ERAU existed was to get the military guys their degrees WHILE they were in the military, and it was their military experience/flying that made the difference, not the degree.

Guys I graduated with have been stuck at the regionals for years on end, nearly 10. Yes, a few have upgraded to captain, which is good, and yes majors do appear to be hiring now a bit, but will they hire the regional pilots? Will they hire the ones that have went up through the "ranks" from being a flight instructor? Due to no debt many of the military guys also start at the regionals depending on the economy and airline needs, so they can also "choke" out the civilian ones at that level too.

This isn't meant to be any kind of cut on the military, it just seems this is the way things have always been and the whole "flight college, flight instructing, 135/regional, major" progression is just not the way anything has really worked in the past. Sure a few have done this, but I think this is somewhat new territory given how many are going this route now.

Here is another one.
 

Getting there is not half the fun it is all the fun.

Flying for an airline stinks. It is boring and offers few opportunities for personal satisfaction. It is a means to an end. A way to make a living. Take away the good living and what have you got?

Skyhigh

The Military Route
 

I believe that one of the major advantages military pilots have is that they come financially secure with a retirement already in place. Not only can they afford to survive as an airline pilot but the airlines know that they will complain less because their bills are paid, they do not worry about their financial future and they do not carry any college debt.

My position is that the cave in of pilot wages is in large part due to government sponsored military pilots and easy to get but hard to get rid of student loans.

Change is coming however, young people who grew up in the great recession will not take on such foolishness as previous generations and the military to moving solidly into drones.


Skyhigh

This is true. The percentages of prior military to non-military background has been decreasing over the years. The airlines like the military training system and the militarily trained pilot was MORE of a known quality than the mom&pop trained civilian pilot. The flight schools that popped up began to train like the military hoping to capitalize on that quality.
A majority of the military pilots already have 4 year degrees prior to commissioning, so few were banking on ERAU to finish their Bachelor's degree in anything. It seems to have been a popular venue to grab a Master's Degree in something aviation related to fill that block.

No Sky - all military pilots do not come to the airlines with a retirement already in place or debt free. The smart ones will prepare just as any other person should financially prepare for a future.

Yep, master's degree was what I was referring to mostly, but many do ROTC too, so it kind of works on both ends.

Skyhigh: many military pilots serve their initial commitment and then get out, no retirement, although real smart ones go guard/reserve. I doubt that "most" of them retired.

Again, Mr. Know it All is pushing the idea that all pilots don't have friends, put their families on the back burner, live in a one bedroom apartment and retire broke. It is impossible for Sky to not be biased because he has an emotional agenda to push, not factual arguments. People here might give you a little more respect if you didn't act like a teenage girl.

Some "experts" have a vast store of knowledge about military and major airline flying, uncontaminated by personal experience in doing either one. :rolleyes: