+++++++++1

I agree, it falls under the heading of "I'd rather be lucky, than good" but to even get in the door, all of us have to have that minimum level of "good". Being able to time the economic cycle would be an asset for sure, but in the meantime, you spin the wheel and you take your chances.

Did you really earn it, or were you just at the right place, at the right time, with the right qualifications? You didn't have any impact on the economic cycle that produced the need for additional pilots at your airline. So, good job being qualified and interviewing well, I'm not sure that counts as "earning it", but it sounds like you're having a good career.

As for the "Then we will accept you as one of us." comment, how out of touch can you get?

630 TT CFI. Still working that hour-building job, hoping like everything I get the sub-20k/year 135 job flying a Caravan that I'll be interviewing for in a week. It would be a pay raise and some turbine time to put in the logbook. Have I disqualified myself as any source of intelligent thought yet?

If not....

Some (I believe, at this point, all) new entrants to aviation don't do it for the money. Or the job security. Or the schedule. I learned to fly airplanes because it was in my blood and for no other reason. If it's not in your blood, and the career has burned you out, I see no reason to stick with it. Regrets over wasted time will only get bigger the more time you waste. Find an IT job making six figures and be happy.

If the thought of working an IT job makes you sick to your stomach, maybe the sub-50k job at the regionals has something to it after all. The industry sucks, but you're doing the job that is somehow stuck in your blood to have to do. If the industry hasn't driven you away yet, that sort of thing must have some monetary value. Either that, or you're hanging on *hoping* things will change. Guess what. They don't.

Just my inexperienced thoughts. I'll crawl back to my part 91 / time-building forum section now.

Alpa and senior pilots decide the payscale for the newest pilot employees. The only people who care about junior pilots are junior pilots.

I need to ask, why do you think you, as a consumer, should be able to travel around the country/world for $100 round trip?

If that's what makes you feel better, by all means keep repeating it. You couldn't be more wrong though.

You're missing the disconnect. You get what you negotiate, and in the Fee for Departure arena the margins are razor thin. Because regionals are paid a set rate for the departure, what leverage are pilots negotiating against? The traditional GWxspeedxseats formula that provided a measure of revenue production (and pilot pay was based on taking a cut of that) doesn't exist. That makes apples to apples comparisons tough between regional and major airlines, but not impossible.

That's certainly nothing you don't already know, but I'd be interested to hear what value you present to the company at the bargaining table.

It used to be if pilots didn't like something, the answer was "next". But now, the available manpower being what it is in the industry, pilots have the ability to be shrewd at the bargaining table. To entertain the notion of pay cuts is crazy. There will be jobs for you in this industry based on retirements alone, and if a company can't afford to pay a living waged, then maybe the MEC's need to cull the heard and demand full pay to the past day.

Pilots eat their own. That's why we have regional airlines in the first place. This job shouldn't even exist. It exists because a bunch of senior pilots sat around the negotiating table one day and told management "We need the most senior pilots to earn $300,000 per year". Management said "ok we'll do that, but then we need the most junior pilots to earn $20,000 per year". The senior pilots at the table paused for a moment. About 30 seconds went by and one of the pilots said "We can live with that". All the other pilots at the table nodded their head in agreement.

I can only commend you for having personally been part of the movement to change the FAA's retirement age regulations. Did earning 5 more years, leave you with carpel tunnel from all the FAA hand shaking you must have been doing. I'm sure all us other lowly pilots owe you some major props for the sacrifices you made for the common good of the industry.

I'm not concerned with being ready for the big leagues. A more appropriate question would be; can I afford the pay cut involved with becoming accepted by you and your sky god brethren?

Agreed, How many mainliners look in the mirror for giving up SCOPE? I didn't get a chance to vote on that. Has to be the MOST concessionary and worst things to happen that we are still suffering for. Face it you were week and gave in to greed. Unwilling to help out your fellow mainline pilots that were furloughed. Question is how do you even face yourself in the mirror? Don't want to be handed a job but do want equal and fair treatment that has yet to be afforded to regional pilots.

Clueless!!!

Meanwhile, over in the corporates, we're throwing offers out all over the place. A friend, at 36, interviewed for a job, the company liked him and only said, "give me a number". With a 2 in front of the zeros, he was hired on the spot, wished he'd asked for more. A flight attendant just got a job on Gulstreams in NY for RJ captain money.

And so it goes, "I want 121 time", right...

GF

What people don't seem to understand is if the law changes allowing NAI (et al), there will be downward wage pressure on all U.S. airlines, making future contracts at all levels lower paying. This will filter down to the regionals, until no Americans are willing to take those jobs, and they will be replaced with foreign workers. The industry (and money) will go overseas just like so many other industries formerly based in the U.S. It will erode the middle class further. I hope you have a backup plan to be one of the 'haves', instead of the 'nots'. This industry is one if the last great American 'know how' industries. Please don't let it fade away.

Short term solution that creates a long term problem

Explain how American regional pilots will be replaced with foreign workers. How exactly would that work? Lay it out please.

PM me offline and I'll explain it better to you. In America, clueless is generally considered a derogatory term, next time just say "I don't understand". :)

Forget it, he's rolling.....

http://static6.businessinsider.com/i...imal-house.png

In the age of short attention span theatre, I'm afraid that if the new generation of pilots rely on 3 second feel-good sound bites, instead of recognizing and negotiating from the complex chain of events that got us where we are, then the profession is lost.

Maybe George Carlin was right about the pu********ification of Americans. If pilots aren't willing to stand up and fight for what they collectivley can achieve, then at least stop whining.

If you're serious, I'll second the clueless comment. If you can't be bothered to educate yourself about one of the biggest threats to the piloting profession, at any level, then what is there to discuss?

Research the US Maritime industry and what impact the Flag of Convenience had on that industry in the US. Should NAI be the camel's nose for offshore, outsourced labor your career is over.

Again, lay out the logistics of how exactly this would work. Don't give me some vague horsesh*t about US Maritime.

Not my job to spoon feed you, but I will wish you good luck prodding your way through life while ignoring the lessons history offers.

Well said. U.S. Maritime is exactly the direction we will go if NAI gets operating permission from the U.S.

It's not so much that foreign airlines will save regional pilots, but that alpa in collusion with airline mgmts have alienated the regional pilot force.

This invasion of low cost international carriers won't be good for our profession, but if alpa doesn't work on its relationship with regional pilots, they will be a force against alpa on this issue.

Alpa can do all the lobbying they want, but that won't prevail against bodies running to those jobs because of the labor situation alpa helped to create.

I can't argue that, although I would caution disaffected regional pilots not to assume their enemies enemy is their friend.

The NAIs of the world aren't wanting rush into our market with the goal of creating rewarding aviation careers. When you look at why they are structured the way they are, it's clear that the goal is to source the cheapest global labor and fly in your back yard (ie. the worlds most lucrative consumer market). If you thought regionals were good at whipsawing, wait until you see it on the global scale.

Regional pilots may be able to stem the tide of demand short term, but long term, should the NAI model prevail, the manpower market for US flying will be global. That will suck for all of us, including disaffected regional pilots.

My previous job at a regional

14 years
Three pay cuts
Final pay @80k per year, take home about $3,800/month
Reserve captain 76 seat rj
Days off 11
No failed check rides, not failures period
No action at a major...jumped ship to Asia on a commuting contract

Contract job...real world numbers been hear 16 months

Captain

Housing paid for by company up to $2500/month I spend 1800 and keep 600
Global health insurance for my family paid for by company, as good or better than previous health care

100k life insurance myself and wife

8k per month loss of medical for one year paid for my company

Minimum 12 days off per month, I can get 24 if I choose back to back

Sell back day off option at $1000.00/day up to ten days per month.

$1,500 per deim

Company buys me real tickets home. If average more than 60 hours per month for three months and the third month is 80 hours I get buisness class....I have not rode home yet in coach...I keep the miles

Company pays local taxes, tax treaty with USA so I pay no taxes...yes true just got them back

I sold back the last two months take home pay with base pay and overtime was

$23,400 last month!

Guys it's a dream come true.

Bingo right here is why we need these companies in the usa. No more of this "honesty, integrity, and mutual respect" while we cut your pay until you work 3 jobs to live.

Please forgive me if I'm missing something, but is the published payscale grossly inaccurate? According to that payscale, that's about $114,000 more than published at min guarantee, and a 747 FO at 8 years and 100 hrs a month would gross $206,400, which is still $8,600 less than what you make in a narrowbody.

Please help me understand. I would be very happy to make that as a narrowbody FO when I get there! If there is a method to it, please share! Thanks!

You're paid like that because that's the price to go over there and do that.

Does anyone here really think that they will benevolently pay glorious wages in the states out of the good of their hearts? You'd better not.

All it would do is force the bar even lower were they to be allowed in here.

Have you ever looked at or taken a cruise? If you have, you will see that nearly all cruise ships are operated under Panamanian, Liberian, or other registry. How many of those who work those ships are paid at US Merchant Marine rates?

Short answer: almost none. Maybe the Master and the First officer, but the rank and file, not even close.

Why? Because crap wages here in the US are darn good wages in these other countries.

Don't believe me? Look at the rates for the airlines that are actively seeking US pilots and compare them to comparable US jobs. Forget Emirates, they are looking for the cream of the crop and don't care where they come from. Look at the borderline companies, or the ones that have perpetual adds on the 350 etc. Same equipment for lower wages in they US. They make sense because there is a huge tax break for ex pats.

I was head hunted by an Australian Saab operator. They were willing to pay me 40% more.... But I would have needed to live in Sydney. After figuring the cost of living, I would have lost money... and I WANTED to take some time down under. And they paid far less than other Saab operators in Australia.... kinda the Colgans of the down under.

Still don't get it?

Okay, I'll try another tack.

Why is it when you call customer support for something you bought in the US, you get a guy who calls himself Fred who has a distinctly Hindi accent? No guesses??? Short answer, "Fred" can make twice what his brethren make by working from 9pm local to 0500 local answering calls from folks in the US calling during business hours. And he is still cheaper that having US folks working from 9am to 5pm.

Still don't get it?

Auto industry. Auto workers in the US in the 70s-80s were paid a very reasonably wage. Then the US market collapsed. Why? Because Asians thought $7 an hour was living high on the hog. (Funny thing is now the Japanese are running into pay issues versus the Koreans)

Final thought. Foreign airlines are willing to pay "Big Bucks" to drag US folks FROM THEIR CONTINENT to work. Why? Because the rates they are paying are not great enough to attract the locals.

Think about that.

They have green slip flying at delta, it's similar to open time pickup/save a junior man, which, pays double time.

Actually yes. Air china is paper basing you China and you begin and end each of your trips from LAX. So again you are an American pilot flying Air China 777's from starting from LAX.

I am not interested in the Norwegian Air debate, but tell he is proof that the system can work.

Also correct if I am wrong, but doesn't Delta hire Asian Cabin crew and run them on flight from say Tokyo to la. Hiw is that much different than Norwegian hiring US cabin crew from JFK to London?

What I am saying is I had bought into the Ponzi scheme of the us aviation career path. I wasted 14 years making nothing while my union brothers were driving nice cars and living in big houses.

Once I opened my eyes and looked what was available I was amazed! Sure not all the contracts are great but it's supply and demand. Right now we are paid what the market is dictating. In the US system their is a value placed on being a "major" airline pilot. I am embarrassed to say that the price of that gamble was 14 years...

So I would encourage any of you who are sick of waiting for your chance to take a look at the contract world. Just google for information but places like Wasinc and Rinsworth are good places to start...

I say let these guys come in. In fact I sent emails telling my representatives about how poor the us carriers treat us. Maybe delta will wake up and not step on us so badly.

What a con artist you are. You can't layout a case, so you dribble on about history all the while pretending your position in the argument is superior. You've been caught pretending you know something, you don't have a clue what you're talking about.

I don't think you fully understand what NAI is asking to do. NA Long Haul is trying to get around paying those high foreign salaries you want.

Ok smart guy, lay it out for us. How will it all work? Who's company? Who's pilots? Corporate HQ where?

OK you got me, I'm obviously no match for your superior intellect. I won't waste you time so you can get back to what ever you Riddle grad IT hacks do. All this time I thought you were actually a (working) pilot. My bad.

Understood. Thank you!

My dog has a better chance of being a real pilot. Get off the computer in your riddle dorm and study up for your fms 101 class. Troll.

The argument is not that the bar would be lowered. That is a given. The argument here is that the lowest NAI bar is still going to be higher than the highest regional bar. And if the U.S. majors (ALPA+pilots+management) choose to collude and offer little more than 20 years of never-ending whipsaws and concessions to regional ghetto dwellers, then fine. That's where we are today.

If NAI=50% of the career we (regional gulag pilots) had been hoping for at a U.S. major then it is still better than the 25% we have had up to now. If there is career damage at the upper levels of U.S. majors, oh well. Gotta grab the best money that is within reach, even if you have to step on someone to get it. Sound familiar?

He has to be trolling. No one can be this short-sighted.

No I am not trolling. This post above is how many of us regional guys feel. The major airlines and alpa have put us here. With no end in sight. Ha maybe 30% of us move on like our ssp is doing. But the rest of us are stuck here making min wage. So if nai or any other carriers come in offering 170k. Yes that's better than 38k all day long.