Where do you work?

 

Supreme Commander on the PMDG 747 Queen o' da Skies on Lockheed Martin's Prepar3d

 

The merit based system doesn't work also. I have seen it where politicking takes over and you get the people with the least leadership skills moving up. Why do you think many officers were shot in Vietnam and not always by the enemy? I have had my hands tied as a commander from your merit based system and my nephew had the same issues in law enforcement. I doubt your way will be any better and maybe worse. Utopia does not exist.

 

Well that's it then. The consensus is clearly that pilots are generally incapable of controlling their own careers and we should just roll over and do what we're told by union leaders and management (who now share the same beds).

Pilots deserve to have their pay continually lowered. We will never again see the salaries from 20-30 years ago because we aren't professionals anymore, we are just drones who live under a system of controls and entitlements that will never require us to excel beyond mediocrity.

Pilots are incapable of behaving in a professional and civil manner without our little safety nets and rules to protect us from each other. We can't trust other pilots in a fair and open market because we must always have someone to blame other than ourselves to explain why people with inferior skills and abilities have somehow managed to surpass us. After all, they must have broken the moral code to get ahead and make more money than us...it's not our fault. They knew someone, they kissed someone's rear, they cheated the system...what awful people they must be.

We should just go on through life feeling safe in our little communist cocoon comforted by the knowledge we have followed the rules and are therefore "good and moral" pilots.

Keep the blue side up...they said. Not me..Call me a rebel. I say keep the red side down.

 

Propose a solution. Most pilots are just complainers, blowing off steam. Ok, I get that, its an anonymous forum. Nearly all complain, but very few do anything to make it better, always someone else's problem. I want it all, except if I have to personally get involved then forget it. Not saying that's you or anyone in particular.

You can't hope to solve any regional pilot problems whatsoever if there is not ever any consensus from the group on anything. Not one item can be agreed to by the entire group of regional pilots, not one. There is no leadership from above either.

According to a recent forum poll, most airline pilots believe ALPA is not in a regional airline pilots best interest. Do you replace ALPA? Well that depends on whether you believe regional airlines are a stepping stone only or a place to make a career.

Fixing Pilot Pay at Regional Airlines | Airline Pilot Info

 

Thanks for your response.

You're right, we do come in here to blow off steam and I've been doing a lot of that lately. But I do have a solution...

My solution is to get people to see their world from a different perspective. To understand that pay has been dropping in our industry steadily and at all levels...especially at the top end. Everyone complains about the pay of regional pilots and especially regional FOs but I'm trying to point out that the real problem is across the board including the high end. Just look at what a 747 captain made thirty years ago compared with today.

My solution is to shout from the roof until people begin to notice. The reason I'm in the regional forums is because this must start now at the regionals and regional pilots and regional airlines are most likely to act first to fix this.

Stop backing the seniority system, stop backing ALPA if this is what they are pushing. Dump the union if we must (pay won't get any lower).

I find it ironic that a communist country like China will pay a contracted regional captain a quarter million dollars a year to fly an RJ using an open and free market system while an airline in a "free" country like the USA isn't even allowed to hire that pilot as a captain at any price and if they did the unions would demand that pilot start as a new co pilot earning $20K even if they can't fill the seats fast enough. Something there is really messed up.

My solution is all out rebellion. I'm really too far along in my career and maybe I don't have the power to change it on my own but maybe enough people begin to realize and act things will begin to change.

Maybe we need lawyers, maybe a class action discrimination lawsuit. There are ways to make change but it requires a consensus and understanding of what the problem really is.

That's my solution...pass it along.