I knew you were here somewhere.

But yes, you are correct. These are businesses, not charities. I feel somewhat locked in at the moment because flying is the only professional skill I have. I'm trying to change that. If I had known better, I probably would have majored in economics and gone into finance.

 

You remind me of myself ten years ago. When I started flying I imagined that pilots were respected professionals of the sky. Eventually I realised that we were nothing more than expendable tools of the company.

Once you discover that people outside of aviation are treated with more respect and value the end will be near for you.

Skyhigh

 

Unfortunetly it doesnt work that way. I know they probably didnt teach you this in ground school, but you are working under a contract. You cant just decide you want to quote "fight" for higher pay whenever you feel like it. Secondly wages arent everything they are made out to be. You shouldnt be fighting for higher pay, you should be fighting for better work rules. Ask any union guy outside this industry, and you will probably find out that he doesnt give a damn about pay, because he knows he will make it up in work rules. And finally its called a regional, not a feeder.

 

Sad......but true.

 

Question - I keep reading about the regional airlines wherein the management gets huge salaries and the pilots suffer because of it - does anyone have any hard numbers here? For example, what % of the total SkyWest payroll goes to the CEO and the CFO? It would be pretty powerful if it were in fact true that these guys are taking a substantial part of the profits of the company, rather than the actual folks doing the work...

 

You got it backwards. Management gets paid the high wages because they make the pilots suffer. By lowering expenses management is rewarded.

Its our own fault for showing up for the wages and working conditions that they offer.

If managements wages were cut they would simply quit and find a better job. Pilots only complain.

If pilots want to make a better living then they should go to business school, get an MBA and then jump into the management shark tank. You will either emerge as a big fish or get eaten.

SkyHigh

 

Like Skyhigh said, management will up and quit if they aren't getting paid what they want. A manager has so many more career options than a pilot. He has nearly limitless branches and routes available on his career path with easy transferability of job skills. Us - not so much. As pilots, we want to fly. That's it - fly. So, we dig ourselves into a rut. We cannot fathom doing anything else but flying, so we don't quit. We can't just jump ship as the system is set up to screw you by doing so; you lose your seniority, pay, etc. A manager most likely keeps at least what he has, or improves, upon getting a new job, whereas we start at the bottom again. So we become angry and bitter, and take it. Eventually, the love of flying that was used against us is gone, but by then we are usually in too deep to start a new career path.

Being a pilot is such a specialized and narrowly focused job that our career options are severely limited. It's difficult to move from a professional pilot into another professional level job - but not so for most other prof. level jobs. They are seen as having desireable skills, but to the outside world, we don't have much in the form of skills that translate into their professions. They really don't understand what we do, and they are the ones making the decisions. Loving what you do can be severely crippling in this sense. Managers are usually relatively small in number, and are seen as valuable and critical assets, whereas we are just a number in the mass of labor, skilled labor, but with a steady stream of people willing to take the job for the pay being offered.

Anyway, I rambled, but the regionals certainly CAN afford to pay us more, but until they run out of applicants, they have no reason to. To love to fly and do it for a living is a very sharp double edged sword.