Interesting news item on NPR
 

Don't say we didn't warn the airlines when they start scrambling in a few years!:p
FAA: Number of Student Pilots Down : NPR

On and don't forget to support your local NPR station

Just listened and decided to go to APC to see if someone had posted it yet.

An optimist could see this as good for the young people already in the industry. If the issuance for student pilot certificates are lower and in logic, private, instrument, and commercial certificates even lower, then with the large retirement and continuing growth of the global economy, then we should see a rise in wages and benefits due to a shortage.

Did they interview Kit Darby!? :rolleyes:

FAA keeps track of pilot starts and all other certs it delivers each year. I do not have time to dig it up but there is a link to a spreadsheet somewhere on their website with this info. I have learned not to trust media in most things aviation, they simply do not study it hard enough to be accurate and complete. I do think the number of starts and other certs is down the last couple of years either due to the economy, news about the quality of life at many airline jobs, or both.

Does a pilot shortage translate to higher pay
 

Is there any historical data to suggest that fewer pilots means higher pay? Or is the number of hungry airline pilot candidates so far in excess of the available jobs that fewer pilots simply means fewer resumes in the trashcan?

By now there must be some data to prove it either way. This is not the first pilot shortage we've heard about.

90 day fast track to a contract airline will stop this from happening

I'm too lazy to look it up, but I wonder how many commercial pilot certs were issued 2003-2008. I have a feeling the number of "qualified" pilots currently either unemployed or on furloughed will carry the industry well into the next decade.

That will give the airlines and the FAA time to work out a plan for any expected "shortage". Call me a cynic, but I doubt that plan will include much of anything new for pilots.