I was told that they figured that out some time ago and that those two ideas were separated - mission statement redefined.
The current MISSION STATEMENT does not mention such opposed ideas:
Mission

The only 'promote and regulate' I see any more is to:
"Regulating civil aviation to promote safety"
What we do

They (the gov't) at least recognizes this when it comes specifically to Commercial Space Travel as disclosed in this GAO report:
GAO report number GAO-12-836T
entitled 'Commercial Space Transportation: Industry Trends, Government Challenges, and International Competitiveness Issues' which was released on June 20, 2012.

Yes true! Their charter is (was?) flawed. It's funny, way back when there was the CAA which was disbanded and a new FAA was created for many of the same problems with today's FAA.

You guys don't give the FAA enough credit. Having dealt with other aviation authorities, the FAA is by far a very efficient organization in comparison.

$250K??? Put down the weed man. Where did you come up with your numbers? lmao

His numbers are right on. :rolleyes:

.......
 

You guys all need to go get a hobby outside of aviation and the internet......good lord.....
I feel bad for your spouses......

I just love going on 4-day trips and talking about contracts and negotiations and commuting and hiring and blah blah blah.......

my own fault......

so whens that van time??.....

Clinton got rid of the "dual mission" in 1996.

Its true. Even the cheapest 4 year aviation degrees are around $150K. The gold plated programs at Riddle and UND can run you as high as $250K. That's why all these numbers are down. You can't get student loans to cover it, plus if you look at an education as a pure investment, the return on other degrees is much higher than aviation. Not very many people are going to borrow this kind of money just to make $20 or $25K right out of school....

Private aviation student loans went away in 2008. During the last furlough binge in 2007, some guys hired sharp bankruptcy lawyers that looked at the terms of Key and Sallie Mae aviation loans that were not government backed. Because the terms were more like private than student loans, bankruptcy judges began to allow them to be discharged like any other debt. Once this happened, Sallie Mae and Key decided they would only issue government guaranteed student loans which limits you to $80,000 for undergrad studies, even with a bump for aviation. That is what caused many of the pilot factories in Florida to collapse in 2008.

Which is why only the dumb ones are taking up this "profession." Anyone with descent math skills can see that they should take another path and then one of us will be flying them during the week, and they'll fly their Cirrus on the weekends :rolleyes:

Great first post! Very enlightening.

It doesn't have to be that way. I spent around $60-70k for my B.S. Flight Operations, CFII-MEI. Thanks to scholarships, part-time jobs in school, etc., I had $25k in student loans upon graduation. Down to $20k now 15 months after graduation. It's not impossible to get a quality aviation degree for less than $100k.

Yes, I know most of my peers in the IT degrees are debt-free and rocking it right now. But they fly a desk.

I think the smartest move might be get a degree in something other than aviation as a backup plan.

This ^^^^^^^

I got an A.S. Computer Science and A.A.S. Management for less than $15k at the local community college. Used both degrees to help land part-time jobs to pay the way through flight training. Paid massive dividends.

When I started flying, I spent about $15,000 for my rating at a pt 61 school. My first airline job paid less than $20,000 for the first year. Even at $20,000 training cost that would have been a 1:1 ratio, now it's more in the neighborhood of 5:1. That is to just get a commercial ticket. No wonder no one wants to get into this business.

I started flying back in 1991 at a local FBO. I paid for my private pilot out of pocket which at the time cost $3500 if I recall all in (with a little help from mom and dad). Back then, a 152 cost about $30/hour wet. Add on $20 for the flight instructor.

After that, I got a job as line service at the same FBO and paid for all the rest of my ratings by trading line service duties for flying. I think those days are gone forever but back then answering the phones, gasing up airplanes, washing them, etc.. was acceptable work that could be traded for flying hours. Some of the best memories of my life and best friends ever made come from this FBO.

The FBO also gave me my first job as flight instructor, and then flying charter in their twin. I went on to get my ATP at this FBO too flying the same twin that did charter and ME training. Had 1700 hours when I got my first 'commuter' airline gig. Was living at home going to college.

Pre 9/11 days were so much less complicated.

LOL! I wish I was not serious or accurate! Like I said, go tally up all the costs yourself.. I was dumb founded as you are. They hit you up for insurance at the tune of $1300 per semester at Riddle. It keeps adding up.

Flying almost meets the clinical definition of addiction:
- willing to obtain it at all costs, affects life and family, etc.
Other than that it defies all logic given return on investment.
Trying to thread the needle to get that one dream job. The analogy is professional sports - playing junior A or minor league ball at $12,000 a year for a chance at the majors.

When passion flows logic goes out the window. I had a friend that went to chef school. $50,000 in tuition for a job that requires 6 days a week, 12 hours a day, all to start at 35K and maybe top out at 70.

On another note-We push college as a society. In reality a lot of people would be better off in trade school. There's a lot of debt ridden people with a Masters working at Starbucks while their high school classmates make $100K a year as a welder or electrician.

If those numbers are anywhere remotely close to being true, its a very good thing you can't get financing for it.

That said, even if you're playing with daddy's money its a pathetic "investment" to overpay that much for a degree and some ratings. You can get just as good a degree somewhere else and train at FBO's for dramatically less money. Oh but you might not get to solo in an all glass G1000 plane LOL! :rolleyes:

Seeing this cost transition even for private pilots. I still do some GA instructing and all my clients are now high net worth individuals that bought a brand new plane outright. When I got my CFI in 1991 all my students were middle class (police officers, school teacher, fireman, chef, a zoo keeper, line worker at Ford). It really is transitioning to the rich.

Mike Rowe whole heartedly agrees with your point of view.

Agree. I remember instructing several Ford employees.

Yes but that won't work now to get the restricted ATP. To get that you have to have a four year, Professional Pilot degree in an approved program by the FAA. All of those run upwards of $150K.

My youngest brother had 12 yrs of private school (I wasn't that "lucky" and only had the "good sisters" a couple of years). The kid missed one question on the SAT. He's in the 99% percentile. Could have gotten a full ride scholarship.

What's he doing these days? He looks like the third member of ZZ Top and never went to college. Drives an 18 wheeler a couple days a week in Detroit. Probably the only trucker that can discuss ancient philosophy and quantum physics in the same breath but he's happy as a clam. Meanwhile, I'm giving myself ulcers trying to commute to LGA on first year regional pay. But hey, I've got a degree and the student loans to prove it:cool:

Same here. I got a BS in Mechanical Engineering from a local state school; and was flight training during summer breaks at a part 61 school and got all of my ratings up to CFI/CFII.

Gloopy, the numbers are true. Embry Riddle is $43,000 per year, plus $25,000, and $35,000 per year for the first 2 years of flight, with $15,000 for the last year. So plan on a minimum of $247,000 to go there. It's usually more. You would have to be completely insane to go there.

BTW, those are this year's fees, they go up every year.

Why would anyone pay that much money for a job that pays on avg less then 100k? This career is a joke. Spend your life in some garbage hotel for a subpar wage. Just think, a 1/4 million dollar education gets you a 25k job. Oustside of aviation if you say Embry Riddle they would think you went to a ITT type school.

WHAT!!?? You mean it's not the "Harvard" of aviation?

I don't know if that is sarcasm, but I was assume so. If not, I will pray for you.

But it also gets you the possibility of that Delta widebody
Captain seat at Age 45. 20 years in that seat and it will look like a good investment.

However, not everyone gets to the top of the pyramid. How big a gambler are you?

And if you were really that much of a stud, how come you don't go the military route. Ever heard of AFROTC or NROTC?

No one thinks ERAU-BS Aviation program is good inside or outside of aviation. Engineering is a different story.

The rich and the recipients of government schemes. Fascism at its finest.

My point still stands though. There is no way on earth it costs a quarter mil for a bachelor's degree and multi commercial/instrument with a cfi. Not even remotely close. Anyone paying anywhere near that much is in fantasy land and needs to be cut off all forms of government assistance.

Or you could take that money and spend it on a medical degree or spend half of the money for a top flight MBA program and you'll be making what that widebody captain makes at age 30.

Now does it look like a good investment?

Thank You!!! The real conversation is why would anyone right now want to learn to fly and spend the money for a $25k job. Now where you decide to go to school for this dying profession is another topic. If you are reading this and thinking of being a pilot. Go to any school and get a non aviation degree and get your license and a local airport. Going to UND or Riddle will give you no advantage when you apply for your first 121 or 135. When airlines start compensating pilots what they should be making, then I could justify wanting to go to Riddle. For the wages pilots make now, I wouldn't drop one dime at those expensive schools.

You have to first get into a Tier 1 MBA program. A general MBA from a place like State U only gets you more debt. MBA degrees are a dime-a-dozen in the real world. You'd be better off spending it on flight training.

Not true at all, unless you are trying for a big firm on wall street. I will agree for your first job it help a bit in the long run wont mean crap.

I don't buy lotto tickets either.


ROTC is fine. Actually AFROTC worked out great for a couple friends in the 80s when the AF gave out too many full rides. At graduation, they were given the option of NOT going active because there were too many officers already.

Or there is the enlisted route. With Tuition Assistance, good planning, and persistence in a six year hitch a guy could get out with a BS for next to nothing...... And after getting out, the GI Bill could cover about half of his flight training at a less expensive 141 school. An 18yo kid could get out at 24 with a degree, Comm ASEL/AMEL, and CFI with zero debt if he saved a few bucks while on duty and had a part time job during flight school. Instruct for a year, fly a Caravan or Navajo for a year, move up to a King Air (preferably with glass), and then a Brasilia. Now he is about 28, zero debt, great experience, and can be pretty picky about where he goes next: corporate, charter, fractional, regional, or (if he really works the job fairs, etc) maybe even mainline.

But it takes work, planning, and sacrifice.

Or just get a bunch of loans and be in debt forever because it is easier.

Disclosure: that enlisted route was almost exactly the one I took. CFIIs were more in demand and I took a signature loan of $2000 (about 20 hours of Instructor pay) to finish up. Loan was paid well before I quit instructing, and I haven't eaten ramen since ;)

All that worked well until the new ATP rules came out. Now to get hired under the new ATP rules, you MUST have an Professional Pilot Degree or be a graduate of a military flying program. It is a completely new world under this rule. The days of going to your FBO, building time and getting hired are over, unfortunately. There are going to be two ways to get hired in the future. Go through a military program or a college program. And the cheapest Professional Pilot Degrees in FAA approved programs are $150K.

Personally I spent $30K to get into this profession. If I were looking at this now there is no way I would spend 150K for it. The return just doesn't justify the investment.

You don't know what you are talking about. My brother got his accounting and MBA degrees from State U for $75K and was making $150K a year at a Fortune 500 company by age 30. Lots of work out there if you have an MBA and an accounting background.