If I may be so bold as to make another prediction.

Again the top dollar pay at a major will be what increases the least I believe as a whole in the next 10 years.

If for example the the ME airlines run into major staffing problems which I predict will happen they may allow US basing of crews. Also their pay could skyrocket. Say 450k-500k a year while top US guys are still in the ~350k range. If that happens you could see guys at 61 or 62 in the US take early retirement to work for the $$$ for the last few years of their career.

I know a lot of you guys will say oh hell no to that. But guys that have had nasty divorces and kids later in life about to start college may pull the trigger. I mean you could still be based at home and get a 100k a year raise for 4 years... It's not for everyone but I have seen this happen to a few people who took the money.

 

"Real cost of becoming a pilot in the year 2000.

35k and you have a commercial multi
15k college education
50k total"

Methinks you weren't around at that time to use those numbers. Heck, that would've been cheap in 1990 when I was in school. And I went to a university with State in the title!

Do you remember pay for training at regionals? $11k for that alone and it was mid-90's!

I'm not saying a pilot shortage isn't coming but not at the good places. And the good places won't need to lower their standards for a good long time.

 

The FAA website shows newly issued ATP certificates averaging over 8500 pilots per year. And, it has been that way for years. 2015 had over 10,000 ATP certificates issued.

Look around, we are hiring pilots over 50, why? Because they want the already high paying jobs in the Airline Industry. They will make over $240K before they retire.

 

TOUGH LUCK!! RIGGED! (wait..)

No, just kidding.

I'm just using that as an example that two kids from each town need to choose to become pilots each year and we are all set. Higher experience levels required for ATPs will force guys to keep instructing resulting in a robust training pool for new entrants.

 

This can be fixed mostly by regulation....

- eliminate or significantly reduce the 1500 hour rule

- raise or eliminate the retirement age, make the medicals more stringent

- allow for lower cost of GA training by eliminating rules and regs. Perhaps create a special student pilot path to ATP mins which is less expensive than doing every ticket one step at a time

 

No, no, and that's how you get AF447 and several other accidents.

 

Right

Just some silly humor I was throwing in there.

 

I don't get it.......are we mad? Or happy?

Why is this in the United thread?

Who cares how many apps we have on file?

Aren't the regionals still filling classes?

Why do we care about Chinese and Middle Eastern pilots?

Why do we care if senior pilots quit to go make more money before they retire?

It's been expensive to become a pilot since the early 1900's what's so different now?

Every pilot has worked garbage jobs before they landed a gig at United or Delta or American or Southwest......some even worked for PanAm TWA Eastern Southern Braniff......what's the difference with today?

I can't figure out why you started this rant........

 

Because the rest of us will have to fly with them in the rt seat. I'll be retired before they hit the left seat.

 

Some even had to work for Continental