The Regional Poverty Churn
 

There has been increased media coverage lately of the chasm between QOL/pay at majors vs regionals. I don't think it even covers the whole story or goes far enough, but I think there's also a significant aspect of regional life that has been overlooked - let's call it "regional churn".

There's almost no point to life as a regional FO. Yep, that's a sobering claim. The primary point is to spend as little time as possible as a regional FO in order to upgrade, gain turbine PIC and move on to a major... or skip the upgrade and catch a rare direct opportunity. Stagnation as a regional FO is a career death sentence and likely costs a large percentage of future earnings, opportunity to save for retirement, etc. $20-$40/hr does not pay many bills.

I can think of dozens of FOs at my airline who are on their 2nd, 3rd or even 4th regional airline, through stagnation or the company shutting down. I can think of more who have left this regional for another one, weighing the pros and cons of yet another year at $20/hr and once again slotting in at the bottom of a seniority list.

From management's perspective, there's nothing wrong with this. It keeps labor cheap and the churn occurs cyclically with new contracts, adding or dropping aircraft, etc. Just business...

From the prospective of the profession, this has caused many high quality pilots to leave the industry all together and has significantly damaged the careers of many many others.

Thoughts and comments? How does this become a story the media can latch on to in a way that can benefit us all?

We should stand up against the companies and vote NO on the crappy contracts they offer....wait we have done that, but there is the problem of the FOs that leave to another airline, sucking up first year pay and chasing the quick upgrade.
As long ad there are places with opportunities to upgrade quickly and get out, the cycle will continue.
Those who have held strong will be downsized or eliminated.
It has happened before, it is happening a lot right now, and I'd put money on it that it will happen again.
I just hope too many people view regional pilots like I view the fast food workers who want $15 an hour to flip burgers.

The Regional Poverty Churn
 

You guys are sounding like progressives. Most everyone I met in my time in the regionals were die hard conservatives where the market place dictated wages , entrepreneurs like Bedford took the risk in starting the business therefore they should get the reward. you know like in Atlas Shrugged. Quit the whinning, nothing is gonna change you are all pawns in a career you freely chose. Deregulation has seen to that. Sorry to be so pessimistic but I got out of the regionals and make descent money teaching corporate guys at one of the big three flight training centers. I wake up in my own bed everyday an i do not miss the lifestyle and headache one bit. BTW I am a proud progressive living in the two Americas.

The regional model functions EXACTLY the way it is supposed to!

NOBODY cares about the "profession" at the regional level, not management, not unions, not the government.

Management is happy as long as planes fly, costs are low, and nobody crashes.

Government is happy as long as ticket prices are low and nobody crashes.

Unions are happy as long as their REAL constituents (wide-body CA's) don't have to take pay cuts to subsidize regional pilots.

The underlying enabler of all this is the longevity pay scale...naive people are willing to come to work for poverty wages (or even migrant farm worker wages) on the premise that a few years down the road they'll be making $70K and before long $100K. Of course management uses whipsaw, BK, COMAIR, etc to shuffle airplanes around, ensuring that anyone pursuing a regional "career" will start over at $20K every few years. The longevity scale is the bait and switch of this con that keeps the suckers coming back again and again!

The only possible way regional pilots "might" have a shot at mitigating this issue is to collectively reject the longevity scale and set an industry standard pay for each equipment/seat. Don't get me wrong, there would still be seniority since that would determine equipment, upgrades, schedule, vacation, etc. But having a flat payscale would remove the incentive to move planes (and pilots) between regionals...that would just incur training costs with no savings on pilot pay. The challenge of course would be implementing this as managers and senior lifer CA's would resist since you'd have to "lop off" the high end of the pay scale to balance raising the low end. It would also have to be coordinated industry-wide, which would be real hard with certain pilot groups signing decades-long contracts which essentially screws future pilots who are still in grade school.

Regionals are not a game you can win, or even break even...it's rigged heavily in the house's favor. If you have independent financial means, a regional job might provide a fun hobby and flexible life-style while giving the appearance of being a productive member of society.

All valid points. It's too bad the flying public is ok with outsourced metal and that it's legal for 6+ different regionals to all fly "Delta" or "American" routes. Getting all of that flying back into the majors would be a step in the right direction.

But the people who make those calls have no incentive to do that...quite the opposite in fact. Wish in one hand, poop in the other and see which one fills up first.

Great points Rick. The regional airline model is a triumph of labor market ripoff, a shockingly successful racket with the primary goal of moving money out of the hands of ordinary pilot-worker into the hands of those who are more aggressive and cunning. It would really be nice to see an end to it during our lifetimes.

Clearly the regional model is beneficial to the major airlines but it doesn't have to be. It will only be if you sit here angrily on your computer and type hateful things about people who want it changed. So, either you sit on your hand full of poop or spend your free time trying to ensure better lives for people who follow you into this profession. Seeing as most pilots are generally egocentric and ignorant, they would rather sit in their own crap until they get theirs.

Yaaaaaaaawnnnnn

It took a hell of a lot more than things like internet posts and rants to change how businesses treated workers during the industrial revolution. It's going to take a hell of a lot more during the outsourcing revolution.