CNN piece "Airline's Dirty Little Secret"

You do realize that up until recently, PFT was "normal" at the regional level...

Not really.

Even back in my regional days you had choices and it was still seen as an aberration for the most part.
 
Its pretty crazy sitting in the airplane making $21,000(with per diem:D) next to a senior capt making 100,000k+ and thinking that its not fair. Then he looks over and go, you know you young SOBs are lucky as hell. I made $1000 my 1st year at ASA, ($11,000 gross-10,000 PFT) had to pay for my hotel, go thru a hellish E120 training program, and when I finally moved to the right seat of the jet, I got $21/hr! And this is the conditions for pilots that were hired with aleast 2000TT!

It will be very hard for the public to care when more senior pilots at the airline really don't care(basically everybody past 1st yr). They look at it as "heck, they have it ALOT better than we did!" And its only one year, they'll survive!

1st year pay at the airlines is a tradition that will not stop until there are no resumes on H.R.'s desk.

Love the excuses. No wonder things won't change.

The only people that will change our conditions are ourselves, at least those of us who give enough to actively fight for better conditions.
 
Love the excuses. No wonder things won't change.

The only people that will change our conditions are ourselves, at least those of us who give enough to actively fight for better conditions.


The only problem, and as I see it, it is a big one, is that you are asking essentially an entire generation or a good part of one, to walk away from flying so the already established generation can reap the benefits of higher pay and better conditions.

We all want the same thing, but the way to go about it, IMO, is being oversimplified and the brunt of it is being put on the younger generation of pilots.

Saying we will fight for better contracts and such is fine BUT the RLA has been all but castrated, as a pilot group we have lost our one tool, self help. Asking the bottom 1/3 to 1/2 of a seniority list to just quite so that pay must be raised to attract more "experienced" flight crews isn't fair either.

Getting ALPA or IBT on property isn't going to make things better just because it is ALPA/IBT/insertanyunionhere. Most pilot groups are simply made up of too many senior folks who are not willing (and I cannot blame them) to lift up the bottom end at the expense of lifting up the top end as much.

I believe our help needs to come from regulation change and more strict duty and flight rules. Stricter requirements for pilot experience as well, ie requiring an ATP for ALL 121 pilots and requiring a minimum of 500 hours in type before being PIC (obviously exceptions will need to be made for new airframe types on property).
 
Well, that first sentence. . .wrong.

But, I'd like to know how you arrived at that conclusion by my words in the quote you selected.

I'm not asking anyone to leave the profession, I might be asking people to actually take an active role in improving it. Significantly different. What/where that role is, and how it is exercised, well. . .I don't really care, but so long as you're in a position to improve the conditions in which we work under - I can't think anyone would be disappointed in what medium is used.
 
I should have prefaced the post as I was not directing at you specifically, you simply had the post that I allowed me to highlight what I perceive to be the larger problem at hand.

Your response was to someone else's post who very basically said, pay and QOL issues won't improve until HR has no resumes, to which you responded (paraphrasing) "love the excuses". Leading me to infer you think/thought that no one applying for jobs is the solution and by extension those currently holding the jobs should quite. Again, not directed at you, just what I see to be the train of thought by many "...don't like it, quite and let those already in reap the benefits..."


My observations from talking and debating the problems with people from all over the industry and all levels within their respective careers.
 
I think this industry came a hair away from increased 1st year wages in '07/'08. There were rock bottom minimums and some airlines were giving hiring bonuses and referral bonuses to employees who recommended a new hire FO. If the economy didn't take a dump and the retirement age was not increased, I think maybe the airlines may have bumped up the first year pay a little by now.
 
I think this industry came a hair away from increased 1st year wages in '07/'08. There were rock bottom minimums and some airlines were giving hiring bonuses and referral bonuses to employees who recommended a new hire FO. If the economy didn't take a dump and the retirement age was not increased, I think maybe the airlines may have bumped up the first year pay a little by now.

Yo I've been saying this for a while now but people still swear by the "oh they'll just drop minimums" negativity. This is after its been proven that Comair and PNCL offered significant 1st yr pay boosts.
 
Yo I've been saying this for a while now but people still swear by the "oh they'll just drop minimums" negativity. This is after its been proven that Comair and PNCL offered significant 1st yr pay boosts.

They obviously didn't want it bad enough to sign onto a new contract, though.....
 
Well, I, for one, am up for a trip to the steps of the NTSB with recommendations. May never make it through the door. But, we won't know if we don't try.

Same for visiting our Congressional leaders. Bring it to their attention. They won't hear unless WE make noise.
 
One of our prominent members of the community, not I, has a high-profile meeting with a congressman next week. If that bonehead doesn't browse this thread, I'll scalp him.

(You hear that? :))
 
Its pretty crazy sitting in the airplane making $21,000(with per diem:D) next to a senior capt making 100,000k+ and thinking that its not fair. Then he looks over and go, you know you young SOBs are lucky as hell.....

Do you have to restrain yourself from punching them in the mouth? That's what they deserve for those kinds of ridiculous comments. Lucky, my ass. :rolleyes:

Is there anyone in the aviation community with the last name "Cohen" that isn't trying to bend over pilots? That's not meant as a racist thing, but that name keeps popping up.

Jonathan Cohen is Director of ALPA's Legal Department. Great attorney.

You do realize that up until recently, PFT was "normal" at the regional level...

I wouldn't really say "recently." By the early '00s it was pretty much coming to an end. I just barely caught the tail end of it before it all but disappeared. It was very widespread throughout the '90s, though.
 
We've only been picketing with signs that say, "I make less than $21,000 a year" for about fifteen years. I also seem to remember quite a few full page ads in the USA Todaythat said about the same thing. Now they notice? Whatever.
 
We've only been picketing with signs that say, "I make less than $21,000 a year" for about fifteen years. I also seem to remember quite a few full page ads in the USA Todaythat said about the same thing. Now they notice? Whatever.

And how long will they notice? Is this topic just the sensational headline-grabber for this week, so far as the national news is concerned?
 
Not if we make Remember3407 the watch dog group.

Precisely......and another good one of Remember3407s goals. Big things like this, start as just a simple idea of one person oftentimes. I hope we see the same thing here. :rawk:
 
I think the problem is people(general public) only will care about this for this week only and maybe when the NTSB final report comes out. When it's time for summer vacation planning average Joe will be looking for the deal of the week/month.
 
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