Who knows what the futue is going to bring. It's anyone's guess.
What i do know is that Regional Airlines Costs are going to go way up. There are plenty of people in their 30's, early 40's who have given up on going to a Major Airline. Because of many reasons. Age 65, 911 etc..
If you are making 100k plus at a regional and have a family it would be really difficult to take a 50% pay cut and loss of seniority.
Can you imagine pilots having spent 30plus years at a regional?
The pain. Age 65 screwed a lot of people.

 

Ironically those same people might get screwed again when the 50 seaters start getting parked. It just goes to show that wherever you are in this industry you are never truly safe.

 

Maybe...there are still legions of 300 hour pilots at riddle and other places who will cheerfully undercut a working professional...and the regional model allows for quick and easy transfer of flying away from pilots who ask for too much compensation (say anything over 19K and 8 days off).

Hopefully new pilot certification rules and wary lenders will pull down the pool of cheap entry-level pilots over the long run.

 

I think you overestimate how many new pilots are left. ERAU and other aviation universities have record low enrollments right now. The economy takes some blame in this but also keep in mind that anyone entering this profession now has seen it decline for the last 10 years and the Colgan crash opened everyone's eyes on what has become of this profession.

I think the regional model for keeping costs down is coming to a close. Between the major unions not budging on scope, lifers at the regionals driving costs up, and the lack of people willing to work for rock bottom wages will make it uneconomical.

Keep in mind that last time we had even a minor uptick in hiring (2007) places like Colgan, Mesa, and the rest were barely able to fill classes even while getting kids straight out of school with fresh CMELs. That last hiring wave was during a contraction in the number of airplanes flying and retirements hadn't even heated up. Had we not have changed the retirements to 65 we would probably have never seen the hardships we're facing now as pilots.

 

You might be right, I hope so.

 

You've hit on some interesting points. Age 65 surely has resulted in a major setback for us in our careers, but the damage was already done by major airlines when they started to outsource everything to the cheapest regionals.

You are right, lifers at good regionals like SkyWest, Mesaba, XJT, etc have driven up the cost at regionals. For example costs at above regionals are not that much below majors they fly for due to increase in payrates and work rules which nearly matches or sometimes actually slightly better than majors.

 

I heard mesa was so desperate to get people during the hiring spree that we had a guy get his multi in the sim. Just a rumor, but I wouldnt be surprised since I flew with a bunch of 250hr guys... ...some great, some not so great.

Actual conversation between me and my first FO:

"Hey, how are you, my name is _____, just so you know, this is my first flight since I passed my fed ride yesterday."

"Cool! This is my first trip in a 200!"

 

I heard that one also. I couldn't find a reason that it would not be legal in a level D sim.

 

Eagle was hiring guys and then sending them to flightsafety to go through a Jet course before starting class at eagle. Eagle footed the bill for all of the costs on that. They wanted their low time hires to have a better shot at making it through training.

 

It's not going to be any different than what Delta did, as far as regional scope. Might be a merger or two with a flow through in exchange for furlough protection for United pilots. I predict mass downsizing and mergers at the regionals the next couple of years, 50 seat ops are dead the next round of contract renewals. Buying up majors and 100 seat jets is the new frontier if regionals want to remain competitive. United wants nothing more than regionals replacing their 100 seat domestic market.