When a Major has 50 or 100 resumes for every slot, thousands of active resumes on-file and each of those resumes is "highly qualified," there is no shortage.

When an interview at a Major is contingent upon traveling Grateful Deadhead-like around the country to job fairs, hangar presentations, career conferences and the like, there is no shortage.

As long as there are X number of ATP/1st class medicals for X-1 pilot seats, there is no definitional shortage.

There is no pilot shortage. There are inflections on the demand curve, which are solved by resources.

 

From posters here: FedEx and/or UPS, and UAL have said they have plenty of applicants to fill their needs through about 2019, then they have no idea how they will get enough pilots to fill the slots they are forecasting...

 

What FedEX, UPS, and UAL might not realized though that those same applicants are also Delta, American, and Southwest applicants....

 

Foreign students stop at multi commercial.
They don't have the ability to get the 1500 hours without the right to work, which they don't have.

 

I thought it was easy for schools to sponsor them.

 

Guys please take less than a minute to complete the call to action in favor of the 1500hr rule in your latest ALPA blast mail. There is growing support for lowering this requirement because of the airlines crying shortage. Safety aside, barriers to entry are incredibly helpful in keeping wages up. We all know that when a kid with money or can qualify for a loan they are more than happy to go to work for poverty wages with 500hrs. It takes a little more time and money to get that 1500hrs during which time life starts to happen for people and they start to realize that maybe the ROI isn't worth it without higher wages. People used to become pilots because it was a good career. Those guys are about to retire. The events of 9/11 and 2008 crushed earning potential and 1500 kept many of the more practical applicants in other careers. Only now with wages up will word get out that this may actually be a career worth pursuing again. The problem is the airlines are still feeling the affects of the last 15yrs of damage they did so they want to go right back to lowering the barriers to entry.

This affects our ability to negotiate the contract we deserve. It takes less than a minute to do the call to action. DO IT!

 

I couldn't care less if there is a shortage, a scarcity, or enough pilots. Pay and working conditions have improved, and that is all that matters.

 

So participate in the call to action and let's keep it that way

 

I think this means there is a shortage...

 

Uh, no.

What it means is there is enough movement that pilots don't feel locked into the first company to offer employment and are willing to take their services elsewhere as downside risk has declined to less than upside benefit.

That does not represent "shortage".