It's a euphemism coined by conservative hacks to promote our current rigged social structure. The winners deserve everything they have because, well, they're rugged, and "job creators." Ayn Rand and all that malarkey. It ignores the countless other factors that contribute to our (now more or less) static society.

We're going around in circles. Good luck with your crusade.

 

What criteria would you use? What happens when there is a displacement?

 

That's an interesting concept. The major downside I see is the eventual establishment of a "good old boys club". It happens in every other industry whether one chooses to see it or not. The utopian corporate world that pilots dream of, where everyone is treated fairly and promotions are granted solely on merit, simply does not exist. Human nature is deeply flawed and will always introduce bias into any selection process.

 

What do you mean, when they need bodies to fill seats due to retirements? Use knowledge and skills. Make the pilots that want these positions apply for them (like every other business). These are not insurmountable tasks. Many simulators can be set up to "score" performance, coupled with objective tests and scenarios. It doesn't require a scored-sim, written test, interview, or anything else specifically, but there are lots of options available, options that could be streamlined and still totally functional. Modern HR departments are very objective due to the requirement to protect themselves from lawsuits. This would be a shock of course to transition from the entitlement mentality to the "I actually have to apply for my next position", but it's easily doable for everyone involved and IMO, would force companies to be competitive with each other.

 

As if there's no "good old boys club" with seniority? I'm not saying anything is perfect, but it would be infinitely better than what we have and allow you to take your experience and value to another airline without having to "start over" at the bottom. What you are claiming would be true if every other industry used seniority, but they don't, the opposite is largely true. Modern HR departments are very objective, they have to be to prevent lawsuits, in fact, HR is an entire profession these days. You can probably come up with a million reasons why you can't or don't want to do this, because you hope one day your number will be up to that golden international 777 job, but for the same reasons thousands of pilots will never have a chance, no matter how good, smart, proficient, or knowledgeable they are. This is about allowing the best and brightest at least the chance, rather than just making it entitlement based on when you joined. It's also about being able to take your experience and abilities somewhere else and having actually mean something.

 

What is your defining metric for a "promotion" aka upgrade? There is no breakout for pilots. Certainly you could have Captains do evaluations on FO's and use some type of scoring system for promotion but that would be largely subjective.
Your idea to interview for the position is not rational. Currently we are upgrading approximately 30 pilots per month. We have approximately 1700 FO's. Let's say 850 apply for the position and of those 850, 300 are chosen for an interview. Only 30 will be given the promotion. This would have to be done every month. This means that if you are an FO who meets the "promotion" requirements you'd have to ensure that you were available on the day of the interview. Given the current ops tempo, not gonna happen and consequently unfair.

The seniority system works for the purpose of upgrade. It works for the purpose of commuting. It does not work for the purpose of changing companies. If pilots could move on to a better company without having to "start over" (take a huge pay cut right up the A$$), then we would not have so much stagnation at the upper tiers of the regionals.

We, as pilots, need to cherry pick the things that are good and discard the rest. The payscale should be commensurate with experience i.e. flight time. We should not be penalized so harshly for moving to a better company or moving for a better QOL.

If Sullenberger was hired at Skywest today he'd be paid $24 / hr.

 

Of course this works in any other profession...even the military, but the prospect of having to compete for a promotion terrifies airline pilots for some reason. I'm not sure why but someone once determined that 90 percent of pilots believe they are in the top ten percent of ability and skill. If most of them suddenly found out they were wrong....

You are right though that HR departments in large companies are very careful to avoid favoritism so the fear of "good old boy" syndrome is really not an issue. For the most part, even in the absence of a strict seniority system, promotions would still primarily follow date of hire when experience is in the same ballpark.

It's really not so scary to have a free labor market, most other professions in the free world have it.

 

I don't disagree with this but I don't think it would be an issue. In the absence of a strict seniority system, companies would still try to promote from within when possible and when practical. With such a large group of employees they would still follow a unofficial seniority rules but would not be bound by it nor would the pilots. Allowing the flexibility of going outside the structure when needed...such as is needed now in the current regional airline environment.

This is why it's unlikely that such a scenario would ever exist in a large company with many employees. The process would be more granular.

You're saying it is though you think it's a bad thing to have stagnation at the top end of regionals? I think what would happen is the position of captain of a regional jet would naturally demand higher pay for professional and experienced captains rather than being used as a stepping stone to go back to FO for a larger airline. The regionals would also be able to hire experienced pilots directly rather than upgrading very low experienced first officers who may have only been there for a few years.

It would also eliminate stagnation for first officers at regionals because the regionals would be competing for type rated and current pilots and the ability to move laterally to the airline that is currently hiring would be a huge incentive for the airlines to try to keep those first officers with higher second and third year salaries.

First Officers would probably spend more time as first officers and starting pay for low time first officers probably would be similar to what it is now but airlines would hire higher time first officers as well but at higher pay in order to create a more diverse pool of experience.

Eventually it would level the field and the regional model would fade away as an industry B scale and pilots would simply work for different airlines which would no longer be able to separate costs by outsourcing flights to low cost carriers.

If anyone things I'm wrong about that then my argument is how can it possibly get any worse?

Most pilots would agree with this I think.

 

A "PR company"? LOL what does that even mean?

Yeah, you got me when you "called me out". I'm just a RAA/flight school PR company poster pretending to be a pilot. Guilty as charged.

That's why I've spent years arguing for higher pay and benefits across the board and, of course, massively improved scope that would significantly reduce regional airline revenue streams.

That's also why I advocate for merciless, hyper competitive, devistatting, dream crushing responses from legacy airlines when the day comes that little punk insolent regional airlines try to go IndyAir II with larger planes on their own. I've argued constantly for tightening scope and doing away with things like the "separate certificate trick" that regionals use and profit from to skirt the edges of mainline scope clauses.

That's also why I'm against training bonds/contracts, MPL schemes, reduced minimums (for any flight school, private or Big Ed) as well as being against any kind of government slush fund money for flight schools/colleges and why I'm in favor of higher pay at regionals, full cancellation pay, more days off and better work rules.

If all that reduces the need for what regionals provide and results in more mainline jobs, that's A-OK with me too.

Meanwhile you've advocated against unions and seniority lists, and your only strategy for addressing the so called pilot shortage is to do nothing, even though you admit that if it truly gets to crisis proportions that will increase/guarantee MPL, reduced minimums and pave the way for the "need" for cabotage. Sounds a lot like what an A4A PR firm provocateur would say.

But maybe you really are a pilot. And maybe, one day, they'll finally bust those unions and you can finally get that US legacy widebody captain job that you clearly are qualified for but can't have because of those danged seniority lists.

Oh, and I almost forgot…you also said flying was easy and pilots are basically just button pushers and training/experience really isn't that important anyway. Sounds a lot like a pro-management PR firm (whatever that even is) to me.

 

Filler.......