[QUOTE=DLAJ77;596554]amen brother. i cant believe the wage they make over there at colgan. xjt 2nd year fo probably makes more than a 70 seat dash captain at colgan. so who do you think future flying will go to[/QUO

That has to be one of the most ignorant statements I have heard so fare on this forum. Not counting the guys only getting unemployment who are on the street at the almighty greatest regional in the world. second year pay is 26 at colgan and 34 at exj. Going completely off of just grt thats a 7000 difference. Your rich man! As far as CP pay, xjt guys make 9bucks more an hr. I pulled over 70,000 last yr on the Q.

We just got a union in that WE WORKED HARD FOR AND WILL CONTINUE TO FIGHT FOR but you walked into a job at xjt that already had a union and a contract. Which was an awesome one by the way but really did you make any contribution to that effort of getting that contract besides paying dues when you got hired?

We go where we get hired first as GA pilots, plan and simple! Truely am sorry for all the fuloughed brothers out there but stop blamming everyone else for your problems.

 

hey man, with 7 grand i could pay my entire yearly rent (utilities too!) AND have enough left over to pay car insurance for the year! 7 grand doesnt make anyone rich but it's a huge difference when you're in the lowest tax bracket.
(i know what you mean about everything else, but im just saying.. i'd like 7 grand.)

 

Not to go out to left field here but was talking to a whisky pilot the other day and they are at $36/hr second year...Thats $9000/year or $750/month. That is a huge difference.

Most have always justified the pay by saying that although others make much more second year we will upgrade sooner and start making captain pay sooner and it will all average out. That is certainly no longer the case and its time to put a contract in place to no longer settle for the upgrade bait that colgan likes to throw around. The upgrade and then up and out in 2 years is long gone so colgan will need alot more to keep and attract employees.

 

You hit it right on the head LAWPILOT. Im lucky that I do have a business degree and tons of management experience that has allowed me to get job that pays me extremely well. The problem is that I HATE it.

I interviewed for Great Lakes and was disappointed that i didn't get the job that would pay me $60k/yr LESS than what i'm making at my office job that makes me think about slitting my wrists everyday.

I would also much rather be sitting in the right seat sipping coffee at 350 looking down at suckers LIKE ME who are sipping coffee looking UP and are impatiently waiting for the day to get back in the air!!!

I will probably catch sh1t from a lot of people on here for saying this, but I do realize QOL sucks, bad routes, bad hotels, low pay, benefits, etc. But come on, flying an airplane is the best job in the world. You dont know what hell is until you have to punch in everyday and take 8 hours worth of sh1t from lazy employees, micro managing bosses, and p1ssed off self centered clients.

I was told by my micro managing boss, to find a creative way to make lowering A/R a challenge. To me, a challenge is flying IMC all the way down to minimums, not bill collecting. Cant wait to give him the middle finger....

Our industry does need to be overhauled for better QOL, pay, and benefits. But think about it, how many people take pictures of their office? I have NEVER said " I cant wait to get to that staff meeting".

 

That is exactly what we are starting to do

 

Right on.... Think about how much time of your life you spend working - life is waaay too short to do something you hate. We live in an age where people are what they do. I'm young - however, I suspect that the best years of my life were the 4 I spent in a cockpit not at a desk.

Also, I used to hate when a crusty Capt. would meet me for a 4 day and just start to complain. I had one rule - no complaining. All we have left in this industry is the the fact that being an airline pilot is fun. So, dont ruin that too.

Perhaps - "The sweet aint as sweet unless you have the sour"

Tailwinds

 

I agree whole heartedly with your assertation that flying a plane for a living is great, but keep it in perspective, if it were only about just flying!!!, therfore, your point I quoted here applies in aviation also, and here is why......

You dont know what hell is until you have to punch in everyday and take 8 hours (in block time that means 14 hrs duty time) worth of sh1t from lazy employees (ever met a ramper who could care less if you push back on time), micro managing bosses (we dont have any of those in aviation), and p1ssed off self centered clients. (Ever met a passenger that thinks he owns your butt, because he paid 89 dollars for his ticket)? Point taken????

just remember that there is no perfect job, and come into this industry with your eyes wide open, take the good and bad, and youll have a long career you enjoy as a whole even if you have bad moments...now if I could only get out from under these flourescent lights and back to FL190 on the Fortl4

 

You got me there TPROP4ever!!! LOL

I am realistic about what I am in store for and by no means trying to be an idealist. But it helps to have a lifelong passion for airplanes to be able to better digest the bullsh1t that comes along with it. By no stretch of the imagination do I have a passion for an office.

 

As someone who has been in both law and medical school (both good ones, too, fwiw)--I'm sick and tired of people in aviation with this grass-is-greener mentality. Repeat after me:

-Being an RJ FO or CFI is better than being in law or med school

-Being an RJ FO or CFI is better than being in law or med school

-Being an RJ FO or CFI is better than being in law or med school

-Being an RJ FO or CFI is better than being in law or med school

Ok...rinse, repeat, you'll understand once you get there...

This of course is assuming you desire to work less than 60-100 hours in the same, crushingly uniform office/hospital/etc. for the next 8-10 years before paying off your loans, which will be 2.5 to 3.0 times what your aviation loans were. And when I said 60-100 hours per week, I don't mean like flying 60-100 hours per week, where you have a bunch of "down time" on VFR days...I mean really, truly, sitting there and working. Imagine every spare minute you were in the cockpit/on a ground sit/in between legs/in the hotel on a long layover that instead of watching TV, surfing the net, reading the USA today, or doing sudoku you were reading your CFM, FOM, and problem-based scenarios based off of them and being expected to regurgitate verbatim roughly 90-100% of the information within, in addition to using that information to analyze real-world scenarios with 90-100% accuracy...

We may have our flight geeks who do the above, but 90% of us have a heck of a lot better QOL than Doctors/Lawyers...and unless you can't make it to a corp. or mainline gig within 8-10 years of getting out of flight instructing, it's a financial wash, even at these payrates, even in this economy...