Use an App review service like Cage and Marshall. They look for mistakes and know the right way to answer questions like the one you mentioned. At the very least it will give you peace of mind that it is not an application issue that is holding you back.

On that one I would not say you were fired or quit in lieu of termination, just treat it as a regular job change. I can almost guarantee you on the flight school’s end it will show that you just quit, not fired.

In over 40 years in aviation I've never heard it called "compression."

If you think this is "bad" then clearly you have not studied industry history. If I understand it correctly you had real turbine time under 1500 TT, and are getting typed in a jet. In the actual "bad" times you'd never see a jet until about 5,000TT, and it would be right seat.

I question somebody's committment when they can't even take the time to learn industry history. Even with this slowdown, this is still a great time to be breaking into the career. You'll be flying jets long before any of us ever were.... and soon enough wil probably be telling the senior guys to get out of your seat. The entitlement attitude just below the surface comes through pretty clearly with you..... You were seriously expecting to be called right away at - or near - 1500 hours as if it were owed to you from being told to reapply in six months. Clearly you have not been keeping pace with actual state of the industry if that's what you expected. Again, a committment and entitlement ripple just below the surface.

I'd go get real resume and interview practice. A great application & resume can get you in the door over a better qualified applicant that did not take the time or effort to spruce up his package. The saying goes that once you get the interview it's yours to lose; so go get interview prep as well.

You're doing the right things; keep it up. Build more time, get the jet type and time in type, keep plugging away. Just lose the subtle chip on the shoulder entitlement thing.... most won't even notice it, but a trained inteviewer certainly will.

Are we running checks at 2am anymore? How many of those old classic turbine and other flying jobs are out there that are left? What does a new guy do these days? Compression is real, there just are not that many jobs out there anymore combined with a record number of people seeking and accomplishing their flight ratings. They fell for the advertisement and/or had horrible mentors. But they spend all this money on flight training only to find out that they cannot get a single job once they are finished. But the bottom line is that there are just not as many low level flying jobs out there anymore.


To those looking to start flight training or are currently in it I would carefully reconsider. Now is not a good time to start in the aviation industry.

industry contraction I'd get... but compression is just a weird use of the word.


there's plenty of jobs out there other than 121. That the younger crowd isn't as willing to relocate to fly as much as prior generations speaks more to the entitlement sentiment and expectations not commensurate with industry realities more than job availability. Is the 121 and even some 135 markets temporarily tighter, yep. However, if one is committed, there are definitely jobs available. More than we had at their age.

my point is there are less low time pilot jobs out there then there was at the turn on the century. Not sure what you mean by plenty, but many people cannot find a job right now despite firing out resumes to all four corners. Combine that with all the people who fell for the pilot shortage advertisements of the last few years......ooof, way too many pilots and not a lot of job openings. Not good right now for those guys and there is no sign of it getting better anytime soon.

Not sure how someone qualified for a job and wanting said job equates to being entitled?

There's still a lot of jobs out there for folks. Just a quick browse showed this one that pays 120-190k a year for atp minimums with 500 multi. https://www.paycomonline.net/v4/ats/...5796E5B2C21B53

I don't think entitled is the right word. A few people come off that way but most are just consternated. They were sold on the pilot shortage by flight school marketing, maybe watched a few acquaintances get desirable jobs and now they feel like they can't get a job cleaning toilets at an airport. I certainly felt that way after 9-11.

I don't think this will be as bad as the lost decade (unless age 67) but it's a big shock after the last 3 go-go years.

The age old problem with a job search in this industry is the difference between posted minimums and competitive minimums. One is known and the other can only be guessed. For someone new to the game it's confusing to be told reapply when you meet our minimums then get crickets when they meet them because in reality they are nowhere close to getting a call but the posted minimums will stay the same so the DOs kid or some other pilot with a connection can get in.

Thus the advice to apply everywhere as soon as you meet the posted minimums but don't be surprised if you don't hear anything even if someone you know got hired there 6 months ago with less than you have now. Come here and ***** but don't give up.

What do you mean by "a lot"? Do you have that number compared to the number of low time pilots looking for a job?

So far people that are saying no one should have an issue getting a job these days have qualified it by "plenty" and "a lot" when mentioning the available jobs out there. Some people are woefully out of touch to the current reality to low time pilots.

look, we get it. You got lured into starting down this path by promises of quick progression, decent pay even in the regionals, and fast progression to the majors. And that was even happening - at the time. But that time was an artifact, caused by the belief that COVID was going to cause years of decreases in 121 flying. That belief lead to a number of companies offering early retirement to those within three or four years of mandatory retirement and those people taking that retirement. But that wasn't exactly how COVID played out. Instead you had rather unprecedented movement in the 121 world that lead to all that movement, sustained briefly by the fact that - yeah, a lot of boomers are retiring. But it wasn't a steady state situation. Ever hear of 'reversion to the mean'?

Reversion to the mean, is a statistical phenomenon where extreme values tend to move closer to the average or mean over time. And the historic mean is that - unless you were military trained - you were likely to require 6-8 thousand hours of flying time, at least a thousand of that TPIC and multiengine, a four year college degree, and a pretty clean training record to snag an interview at a major, and probably 3000 TT and 1000 ME to be competitive at most regionals.

Now I doubt that it will get quite that slow again over the short run - not unless we get age 67 retirement anyway, but right now there are the additional problems at Boeing and supply chain problems at Airbus and - oh yeah, two major engine manufacturers that have a lot of engine warranted work to do for COVID supply related mistakes, so a lot of planned expansion (and replacement of older and less efficient aircraft) is on hold.

The point is, you are probably not going to see the sort of rapid career progression you saw three or four years ago for another few decades - if ever. You need to adjust your career expectations. Nobody is going to get by with just the minimum qualifications unless you just married the CEOs kid. It just isn't going to happen.