Honest question: It's great for newbies who want to upgrade to those early-year left seats, but why are those left seats so undesirable that thousands of pilots above them didn't bid them? There's definitely a wow factor on the opportunity, but also a wow factor that something must really stink (apparently worse than when you guys were hired) for most of those eligible for such upgrades to pass on them.

FO pay has gone up.

Different FOs have different reasons. Many were genuinely surprised at how junior the left seat went and did not have bids in. Others have been furloughed through the lost decade and are chasing QOL. Some probably bid with LCA others probably enjoy WB FO and yes being junior in NB left seat can be very undesirable.



As always options are always good. But for those paying close attention the "early left years seats" peaked on the May 2017 MOAB and have been trending upward ever since - I trend that I think will continue.



Scoop

Another possibility is inertia. This is the first time in a LONG time where there has been real (semi-stable) upward movement. This due to several factors: the beginning of the retirement wave, four years of hiring and some growth of the seniority list.

Imagine having been in a specific position, bidding the same way for the last 7-10 years. You know what to expect each month, you know what your paycheck is going to be, you know the airplane and the people with whom you will most likely fly (seniority range) and you've figured out all the tricks to maximize your pay/QOL (again, based on where you sit 'on the list').

Once the movement starts, many pilots will say 'I'm keeping what I know and will see how the chips fall before I put in my new bid'. Now that the upward movement appears to be stable and sustainable (at least for the near future), I suspect that we'll see upgrades going more senior. We, in general, don't want to give up what we know until we know the new seat will be an improvement.

Not commuting to the junior bases and top 30% of 7ER or larger can make narrow body captain pay with a little understanding of the double and/or premium pay opportunities. All while still maintain control over their schedules with the benefits of seniority in the right seat.

That question has been asked for decades. I propose it is an irrelevant one because there are 14000+ ideas as to what the ideal kind of flying is. What you are really asking is why the flying is not stovepiped. There will probably be FOs senior to me on the day I retire 7 years from now. Why is that?

You are trying to tie junior captains to crappy flying, and that is simply not a complete picture for the reason. You have senior guys doing the same crappy flying. I could ask you why would they want to do that when they could downbid and make the same or even more bank.

I would agree. I was awarded Capt on the Feb 17 AE and have gone backwards on every single AE since then. I think the fact that AEs are
now few and far between also pushes a lot of FOs off the fence in fear of having to wait another year or two for the next opportunity to upgrade.

...annnnd enter Sailingfun to tell you how this a completely false statement and that AEs are on the same pace as they have been since 2004 which is the beginning of all Delta measurement periods 😁

I just post exactly what the AE’s have been including every month we had a AE over the last 5 years. I guess you don’t like facts when they don’t match forum lore. AE’s are slowing. They are averaging one every 3.4 months now down from one every 1.8 months prior.

Believe it or not, I'm not trying to do anything other than understand what's different between years ago and present. You implied there is a major difference with regards to upgrades, and their timing now vs your younger years.