Head of FAA says changes "not necessary"

Well, it's a good thing I'm not a negotiator lol. I definitely think that low timers are worth the $40,000 starting.... like my friend out of college, I don't think any entry level job in a professional industry should pay less than that.

I guess that's a bit better. :dunno:

Anyone flying an airliner is worth a livable base wage and basic human rights for quality of life, regardless of the individual's total time.

And, I'm saying a mandated total time would not directly relate to the above. That is up to the pilot groups to negotiate.
 
Ohh, jeesh man, I'm sorry. Wasn't looking to smash anyone. I guess I just think its funny when guys in white collars have punk and anti-authority band logo's on their flight cases and stuff. (like hippies turned CEO's) I hope you don't take offense. It'd be like when I have a "I have SJS" on my flight case and walk into my turboprop. I wasn't trying to play Velo.

Also, I just saw that on hulu and thought it was a good time to post it up. Not knocking ur personal finances

I'm a closet revolutionary. :D But yeah, I don't think I'd put a Rage sticker on the flight case.....

I agree with don't spend more than you can afford. All I was trying to get back across was that from my "living room", I would feel most comfortable with the financial "power" of $100,000 annually. That hasn't happened yet, so I don't have anything near that level in terms of personally purchased things.

It's amazing how long you can make the things your parents got you while you were still a dependent last.

Heck, I like playing the "we're going to throw this away, do you want it" trash heap.... I have a 32" TV manufactured in 1994 in my apartment. Kinda wish they'd given me the microwave they chucked since it would have fit perfectly in my smallish place. 500 sq ft rox!!!
 
I'm a closet revolutionary. :D But yeah, I don't think I'd put a Rage sticker on the flight case.....

I agree with don't spend more than you can afford. All I was trying to get back across was that from my "living room", I would feel most comfortable with the financial "power" of $100,000 annually. That hasn't happened yet, so I don't have anything near that level in terms of personally purchased things.

It's amazing how long you can make the things your parents got you while you were still a dependent last.

Heck, I like playing the "we're going to throw this away, do you want it" trash heap.... I have a 32" TV manufactured in 1994 in my apartment. Kinda wish they'd given me the microwave they chucked since it would have fit perfectly in my smallish place. 500 sq ft rox!!!

Hey, talking to a guy that never broke 50k a year. Saved up my money and am a home owner (2900sq foot foreclosure) finally at 28 and still have a 6-8 month emergency fund intact.
 
Hey, talking to a guy that never broke 50k a year. Saved up my money and am a home owner (2900sq foot foreclosure) finally at 28 and still have a 6-8 month emergency fund intact.

Two things I wish I had :)

I have a feeling I'm going to miss the foreclosure purchase boat.... but I don't even have an emergency fund. Once I pay down a loan from my parents (1 more payment), I'm planning on putting that money into savings for a little bit. I'd like to be able to have $1000 minimum in my bank account per month. lol
 
Well, I think the leverage can be gained in stating that it's not an entry-level job. If it wasn't your first job, it shouldn't be paid at "first job" or less wages.

I have personally always thought that the minimum an airline pilot should make FIRST year, is $40,000 as a First Officer. I'd like to see more, but that should be the floor, and nothing less. I don't care how much or how little automation there is, if you GIGO the automation, you can still kill someone.

My friend with a comp sci degree, working on non-safety sensitive programs, no lives at stake, made $40 grand his first year out of college. He also had no flight school debt. He took about 2.5 years at that company to land a job with Verisign making double that.

Meanwhile, I switched from an entry-level IT job paying $36,000 a year or so, where if I screwed up, we'd have productivity issues, to a job making half of that ($18,657 pre tax first year at guarantee; PS I've flown 200 hours so far in 2009), with 50 lives jointly in my and the Captain's hands.

Yes, I took the job, I knew what I was getting into pay-wise, and I made adjustments.... BUT, the minimum pay NEEDS to change for the next guy coming up the pipe. If I could secure improvements in my contract that would get the next new hire $40 grand a year to start, I would sign off on that in a heartbeat. I'm not going to quit; I'm here until I've made positive change.... either we put a bottom-feeder out of business or we get a decent working environment, it's Phil's choice.

PS jnxyjoe that is awesome to play with a second delay between each clip. heheh

The market does not care what you "think" you should make. The market cares what supply and demand "thinks" you should make. Couple years ago motions were in place at several regional airlines to raise starting FO pay to as much as 2nd year pay. Age 65 delayed that. Mark my words by 2013, starting FO pay at the regionals will be at least 35k, unless there is a massive economic collapse or the world ends in 2012.
 
The market does not care what you "think" you should make. The market cares what supply and demand "thinks" you should make. Couple years ago motions were in place at several regional airlines to raise starting FO pay to as much as 2nd year pay. Age 65 delayed that. Mark my words by 2013, starting FO pay at the regionals will be at least 35k, unless there is a massive economic collapse or the world ends in 2012.
You're not right about anything. Why would we mark your words?

I keed I keed.

Pay will go down (adjusted for inflation).
 
Couple years ago motions were in place at several regional airlines to raise starting FO pay to as much as 2nd year pay. Age 65 delayed that.

Actually, the Unions at those properties killed that idea, and rightly so. A whole lot more than first year pay needs to be fixed to attract the right sort of candidates.
 
You're not right about anything. Why would we mark your words?

I keed I keed.

Pay will go down (adjusted for inflation).



As long as people continue to believe that being an airline pilot will bring prestige and excellent pay, this will be the case. When people stop caring about what they look like in their uniform, and what equipment they're flying, and start following avenues that are fulfilling to themselves before it fulfills their career, then, and only then, will pay rise. SJS, is something that almost all of us have (even if the jet's not shiny, we still want to get into something "better" than what we're in now, even if that takes a pay cut). That needs to change. Its a tough nut to crack, but there's a reason why freight pays more, people don't flock to freight jobs unless they have to.
 
[/B]As long as people continue to believe that being an airline pilot will bring prestige and excellent pay, this will be the case. When people stop caring about what they look like in their uniform, and what equipment they're flying, and start following avenues that are fulfilling to themselves before it fulfills their career, then, and only then, will pay rise.

:yeahthat:

When people start to realize that it's a job, you do it for the money and stop saying, but I love it and I don't mind doing for cheap, that's when pay goes up.

Management is not going to give you one dime more than they have to. And as long as you've got people who say things like do what you love and you'll never work a day in your life -- mindless bullcrap if I ever heard it -- you will have a situation where management takes advantage of that mindset.

It's a job. Make them pay you. And if they don't, then find something else to do.

Love doesn't pay the bills, my friends.
 
I actually somewhat agree with Mr. Babbitt on this subject. By raising the minimums, you are only putting a bandaid on a much larger problem. Our focus should be directed at initial training programs and continued education, since those are the building blocks of our development.

If you're doing it wrong for 1500 hours, will you be safer than someone who has been doing it right for 500?

Honestly, if we made it harder to become a pilot, then I think you'd get the increase in pay and benefits you want to see. More difficult testing is a good example of an improvement... No more Gleim, but actually having to master the knowledge required to pass written exams. I didn't even discover Gleim until I was taking my CFI written, and my grade was LOWER because I tried rote memorization to pass. Whoops.

Why do you think doctors make so much money? It's because of the difficulty of their education. How many of you here would be airline pilots if this job required a bachelors degree, numerous writtens without the Gleim, and tougher flight standards? Sort of like the JAA requirements in Europe?

Nothing will change... We want it easy, and we want the money too. Personally, I don't think we can have both.
 
Honestly, if we made it harder to become a pilot, then I think you'd get the increase in pay and benefits you want to see. More difficult testing is a good example of an improvement... No more Gleim, but actually having to master the knowledge required to pass written exams. I didn't even discover Gleim until I was taking my CFI written, and my grade was LOWER because I tried rote memorization to pass. Whoops.

Right on. We need more barriers to entry in this business. We would benefit in almost every way. The process needs to get a lot more difficult to become an airline pilot. Right now it basically only comes down to whether or not you can finance the training....that's not a good thing.
 
If you're doing it wrong for 1500 hours, will you be safer than someone who has been doing it right for 500?

...or catch it early and retrain. Old dog/new tricks.

I can understand this, but ideally the higher level rating (ATP) would be the seal of approval that the pilot has been "doing it right."
 
At what point in the past did the FAA change the rules regarding rest and qualifications for the better?

There was a fairly large change to flight and duty rules in 1996, which impacted domestic more than flag or supplemental for part 121. Not sure about 135, but I think that was captured by reclassifying a lot of the 135 scheduled ops as 121.

As for the general thread topic, legislation is usually not the way to fix this sort of thing.
 
"In the pilot community I think it is acknowledged that simply raising the total amount of time by over half is not really a good benchmark for how good the quality of the pilot is," Babbitt says. "The quality of training is far more important than the quantity of training or total time."
Babbitt, who took over as FAA administrator two months ago and is a former head of the Airline Pilots Association (ALPA), says the agency will try to educate members of Congress to prove to them that quality of training is more important than quantity."
I agree with that statement, and I don't understand the complaints of him "selling out". There's never been a 121 accident with a pilot under 1500 hours. "Simply raising the total amount of time" isn't going to fix the problem.

Training, experience (TT), duty time rules, better screening process, it all needs to be put in place. But no matter what happens the day after new rules go into effect a pair of 5,000 hour pilots will find a new way to ball up an airplane.
 
Was the head of the FAA an ALPA leader at one point?

EDIT: He was the former CEO of ALPA.

Now the question to the ALPA good old boys, do you feel betrayed?

No, I am not going to read to far into something put out in flightglobal which is slanted towards one way. Actions will speak louder than words, change is going to happen, we will see where this change comes from. I think it will be in the form of legislation from Congress which ALPA played a large part in. Randy now works for Congress, he is just giving his opinion, which was slanted to meet the need of the publishing source

Literally, not to sound completely dense but I am trying to wrap my head around this, and please correct me if I am wrong.

The Ex-Head of ALPA is trying to shoot down better work rules that are regulated through the federal government when they (ALPA) failed to get those work rules in place on their own. Quality...

In this article, Randy was saying that he believes Congress doesn't need to regulate the new work rules, it can come from the FAA. Also you do sound dense when you say ALPA has failed to get better work rules out there.
 
...or catch it early and retrain. Old dog/new tricks.

I can understand this, but ideally the higher level rating (ATP) would be the seal of approval that the pilot has been "doing it right."

Right now, when you take your intitial PC, even as an FO, you have to fly to ATP standards. Which, in reality, an airplane initial with the associated oral and flight check is essentially an ATP ride.

There was a fairly large change to flight and duty rules in 1996, which impacted domestic more than flag or supplemental for part 121. Not sure about 135, but I think that was captured by reclassifying a lot of the 135 scheduled ops as 121.

As for the general thread topic, legislation is usually not the way to fix this sort of thing.

I agree seagull, but as someone who worked at an airline that fell into this, they were still allowed to use the 135 flight times (120/30 1200/365) and a few other "grandfather" exemptions on the "commuter category" 19 seat airplanes, while the 30 seaters were under the common domestic 121 regs.

I agree with that statement, and I don't understand the complaints of him "selling out". There's never been a 121 accident with a pilot under 1500 hours. "Simply raising the total amount of time" isn't going to fix the problem.

Training, experience (TT), duty time rules, better screening process, it all needs to be put in place. But no matter what happens the day after new rules go into effect a pair of 5,000 hour pilots will find a new way to ball up an airplane.

Truer words will be hard to be found.
 
Was the head of the FAA an ALPA leader at one point?

EDIT: He was the former CEO of ALPA.

What the hell is a "CEO of ALPA?" :rolleyes: If you're going to bitch about ALPA, at least get the titles right, otherwise you just sound uninformed.

Now the question to the ALPA good old boys, do you feel betrayed?

I felt betrayed by Randy years ago, so nothing would surprise me from him. He was hired by Pinnacle management in about 2004 to sit across the bargaining table from us and assist management with negotiations. Traitor. I was hoping Captain Woerth would get the position of FAA Administrator, but the politicians wouldn't accept him. Babbitt was the compromise candidate. He's been a sellout for years, and he was never that good of an ALPA President in the first place, as far as I'm concerned. The worst blunder of our careers (the RJ scope outsourcing) took place under his leadership without him even blinking an eye.

With that said, I'd rather have him in that position that some politician or attorney. Most of what he's been doing has been weighted more in our favor than management's, so I can deal with the occasional back-stab as long as the overall results are improved.

Literally, not to sound completely dense but I am trying to wrap my head around this, and please correct me if I am wrong.

The Ex-Head of ALPA is trying to shoot down better work rules that are regulated through the federal government when they (ALPA) failed to get those work rules in place on their own. Quality...

ALPA doesn't negotiate to set hiring minimums, nor should they. It does no good to set higher hiring minimums at one property when other carriers don't have to follow suit. It just puts your company in a horrible competitive position. This needs to be handled in regulation or legislation to make sure that everyone has to abide by the same minimums.

Um, yeah.

The FAA is charged with the oversight of aviation as well as fostering growth, etc.

Would it perhaps be that Mr. Babbitt is in a position to not appear totally in favor of proposed changes lest he seem totally biased for against a particular group?

He's a politician, kids. Don't take anything he says for face value, regardless of what it is.

:yeahthat: Everyone needs to remember that although he's more favorable to us overall, he will have to side with the ATA and RAA occasionally so he doesn't appear to be too biased. Even President Obama can't keep someone in office that is too blatantly favoring labor.

Hiow long did that take? 6 months to return to status-quo. Nice!:beer:

We're far from status quo. Things have greatly improved already.

Someone must have reminded him about the push for the MPL.

Hmmm.....didn't someone involved with ALPA who actively posts on this board say that the union is for the MPL?

ALPA only approves of MPL if certain restrictions are complied with. Straight MPL isn't favored by the Association.

There's no leverage gained from a high(er) time person from a bargaining perspective, in my opinion.

The leverage comes from supply/demand, which should be easy for a hard-right conservative such as yourself to understand. When the supply is limited, demand increases, and our bargaining leverage shoots up. Pretty simple.

There's never been a 121 accident with a pilot under 1500 hours.

Jefferson City and Traverse City come to mind immediately, but I'm sure there have been others, also.
 
Randy Babbit was at ALPA for a long time, but he also had a consulting firm for ATA for a number of years. I hope he has NO bias at all, for EITHER side, and is not trying to create any "appearances", but just is not biased. BOTH sides need a wake up call. BOTH.
 
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