And then there is AmTrak.........

I'm kinda wondering why Spirit and Frontier haven't gotten in bed together yet...Common fleet, common cost structure. And to think that Frontier used to be a decent airline to fly!!

But there's no way that any further merger of the Big 3 should ever get approved...

Why would they? Both making very large profits. Don't airlines usually merge when one of airlines is about to fall apart?

Indigo is waiting for a counter offer for F9 from JB

It looks like this thread was originally from 2014/2015, but what would a mega merger look like in the present climate? What would it mean for the airline industry if things didn’t turn around in the time frame that everyone is currently hoping it will, and the government decides down the road that the only option is to nationalize the airlines? I ask because nationalization is often talked about in a negative light, but airlines like Emirates seem to have high pay and QOL despite being government owned. Is it just that our situation is just so much more complex because we have many airlines vs other countries who might only have one flagship carrier?

I understand that government regulation in any industry has the ability to stifle growth and competition and to be much less efficient than the free market can be, but how exactly would a giant merger and nationalization of our airlines affect pilot contracts and pay? Theoretically wages would go down, but is there an obvious answer as to what would happen to the number of pilot jobs, and what would take the place of union contracts? Would the government just dictate your benefits, or would there still be negotiation involved?

I don’t know but I can tell you that government workers have unions too and mergers have always resulted in fewer pilot jobs.

More like Indigo is waiting to BUY JB, not vice versa,...

Like the last round, it would happen most likely in association with bankruptcy and downsizing. We might just squeak out a recovery before much of that plays out this time.

Things would have to be REALLY, REALLY bad for anyone to even talk about that. The airlines are not the only critical industries... I think they'd probably nationalize power generation before airlines.

Far more likely they'd just let the industry BK and right-size itself into whatever it's new niche would be.

If you start with airlines, where do you end? Amazon? Even China knows to keep most of its' big companies at arms-length to avoid the stagnation and inefficiency which is inevitable in any civilian government monopoly.

??? EK is not really known for high pay and QOL by US standards... especially the QOL.


Nationalization would be very far removed from where we are today, it would take much bigger changes than just the airline industry to get anywhere near there.

Government pay is already set for all employees, and pilots fall into that scheme. Google what current DHS, ICE, FAA, etc pilots get paid. Probably about senior regional CA pay.

Bonuses can be implemented for specialties such as medical doctors, for retention, or law enforcement for unscheduled over-time. But that probably wouldn't apply to airline pilots, unless they simply had a bad shortage... but in that case they'd probably just hire kids out of HS and run them through .gov flight schools.

Government unions are limited in what they can negotiate directly... they can't "negotiate" a change to federal civil service pay or bennies with their boss, congress has to legislate that. Those unions normally achieve their goals by back-room political manipulation, not negotiation. Nothing like the unions we have.

Also be aware there's not much precedent in the civil service (or the mil) to work 4-on, 4-off, or to fly your line and then go home. You'd probably have to work five days per/week and if you're not flying you probably have to come into the office to do admin, training CBT's, etc. Public perception matters for government employees, and they are not going to give you a bunch of paid days off... looks like fraud, waste, and abuse to the media and voters. Might get around that if your total duty hours hit 40 before 1700 on Friday.

There'd probably be a good gym for your use at the airport though, so there's that.

You'd also probably not be allowed to commute, or if you were there would not be any slack at all for no-shows. You'd probably have to buy revenue tickets to get to work reliably. But you would get a COLA for living in high-rent domiciles.

I could have gotten any of several .gov pilot jobs... I did the airline thing for a reason.

What he said x10.



Sent from my SM-G965U1 using Tapatalk

I wouldn’t be surprised to see some type of merger/acquisition event this year. Now that the recovery is here, airlines can start thinking about spending the capital to make such a move.