SpiraMirabilis
Possible Subversive
True. And Bush did allow ComAir to strike but that was probably because he just didn't recognize the company name. 'Comma Air? I aint never flown on no punctuation yet! Screw em!'
Will regional pay ever go up?
- Thread starter future pilot
- Start date
Firebird2XC
Well-Known Member
Valid point, sir.
Let's face it, kids. Politicians are pro-business enough that until we make it clear through legislation, we're screwed.
We're going to have to spearhead major change in the climate of AMERICA, not just this industry.
I think something major needs to be done.
Bignellyxx
Well-Known Member
Personally i think a good way for pay to go up specifically for FO pay would be next time contract negotiations start up to worry less about 17 Yr capt pay and a little more about 2nd year FO pay. However if your regional has no 2nd year FO's and plenty of 17 yr captains you can guess which one will not improve. Those senior guys pay a heck of a lot more in dues.
CoffeeIcePapers
Well-Hung Member
That is exactly the problem. Get to the top and piss on the little guy.
SpiraMirabilis
Possible Subversive
At mainline carriers the strategy is to increase the "terminal" payrates as much as possible because this is statistically the longest you'll stay at. Like, you'll stay at year 15 pay for over 10 years in your career but only stay at year 2 pay for one.
I think that perhaps that isn't such a bad way to look at it, considering this is the rest of our career. I may be at year 10 regional captain pay for a long time. I'd rather get that as high as possible, personally.
I think that perhaps that isn't such a bad way to look at it, considering this is the rest of our career. I may be at year 10 regional captain pay for a long time. I'd rather get that as high as possible, personally.
Clocks
Well-Known Member
Remember it IS (nearly) a zero sum game. I'm sure they can squeeze a little more out at the margins, but every gain means giving up something.
A union can't really go into a negotiation and say "we want 50 things that increase the company's costs including better first year FO and we'll give up nothing".
Better FO pay = worse QOL for everyone, or lower CA pay, or worse work rules, or something. Guys from year 2 on "had to pay their dues" at 19k/year, and aren't going to sacrifice anything for the rest of their careers to pay the 500 hour wonders more money. LOTS of people will say "we need to raise FO pay", not a lot of senior guys will actually give up a benefit they enjoy (or pay) to make it happen. In fact once you get past the public chest beating, I'd be surprised if anyone, even a single guy off first year pay would actually put their foot down and vote themselves a pay/benefit cut when it comes down to it.
I spent 9 years as a dealer tech. My first year I made $20.50 an hour and IIRC I made somewhere around $40k. That was at 19 yrs. old fresh out of high school. The last year I worked as a tech I was living in FL, and had moved from CA, and took a $4.00 per hour pay cut. My last year in CA I made $66k, but the state and feds took nearly half (I was single and claimed -0-). The nicest/worst thing about being a mechanic is you get paid per job, not per hour. If you can get the job done in 1 hour and it pays 4, you still get 4. But if there is only 1 hour of work to do and you are there for 8, you still only get paid for 1. Surprisingly, when the economy is down, auto techs usually do pretty well. People fix their cars instead of buy new ones. But I wouldn't do it again for $200k a year.
Goodspeed
Well-Known Member
Headline and first paragraph says it all, very sad.
CO-PILOT WAS PAID PALTRY $16G SALARY
ASSOCIATED PRESS
May 13, 2009 --
WASHINGTON -- The co-pilot in a February airline crash that killed 50 people in upstate New York was paid a salary so low that she was living with her parents in Seattle and commuting across the country to her job, according to testimony Wednesday.
READ THE TRANSCRIPT
Pilots Blabbed Their Way to Doom
GLARING SIGNS SMALL TALK BECAME BIG PROBLEM
One of the safety issues that has arisen in the National Transportation Safety Board's investigation is whether co-pilot Rebecca Shaw and Captain Marvin Renslow may have suffered from fatigue during the accident. Testimony in the three-day hearing, which began Tuesday, indicates Shaw and Renslow made several fundamental mistakes as Continental Connection Flight 3407 approached Buffalo Niagara International Airport in wintry weather the night of Feb. 12.
Airline officials acknowledged at the hearing that Shaw, 24, was paid at a rate of about $23 an hour and had a salary of $16,254, although she could have earned more if she worked extra hours. She previously had a second job working in a coffee shop.
The night before the accident, Shaw flew overnight as a passenger from Seattle, changing planes in Memphis, to report to work at Newark Liberty International Airport. Shaw also complained about congestion and may have been suffering from a cold.
Roger Cox, NTSB's aviation safety operations group chairman, suggested while questioning officials for Colgan Air Inc. of Manassas, Va., which operated the flight for Continental, that Shaw was commuting because she couldn't afford to live in the New York metropolitan area.
Mary Finnegan, Colgan's vice president of administration, said the company permits pilots to live anywhere in the country they wish. She said the company also allows them to remove themselves from flight duty if they are fatigued.
"It is their responsibility to commute in and be fit for duty," Finnegan said.
Renslow commuted to Newark from his home near Tampa, Fla. Colgan officials said their captains typically have salaries around $55,000 a year.
A transcript of the cockpit voice recorder released Tuesday by the board showed Renslow and Shaw engaging in chitchat about careers and her lack of experience flying in icy conditions during the plane's final minutes, even after they had noticed a buildup of ice on the windshield.
The Dash 8-Q400 Bombardier, a twin-engine turboprop, experienced an aerodynamic stall, rolling back and forth before plunging into a house below. All 49 people aboard and one on the ground were killed.
Colgan officials acknowledged in response to board members' questions that Renslow and Shaw weren't paying close attention to the plane's instruments and were surprised by a stall warning. Nor did they follow the airline's procedures for responding to a stall.
Further testimony and documents also showed that Renslow had failed several training tests before and after being hired by Colgan in 2005. He had been certified to fly the Dash-8 plane for about three months.
Paul Pryor, Colgan's head of pilot training, acknowledged that Renslow didn't have any hands-on training on the Dash 8's stick pusher -- a key safety system that automatically kicks on in response to a stall -- although he had received hands-on stick pusher training on a smaller plane that he previously flew.
The accident was the worst U.S. airline crash in seven years.
CO-PILOT WAS PAID PALTRY $16G SALARY
ASSOCIATED PRESS
May 13, 2009 --
WASHINGTON -- The co-pilot in a February airline crash that killed 50 people in upstate New York was paid a salary so low that she was living with her parents in Seattle and commuting across the country to her job, according to testimony Wednesday.
READ THE TRANSCRIPT
Pilots Blabbed Their Way to Doom
GLARING SIGNS SMALL TALK BECAME BIG PROBLEM
One of the safety issues that has arisen in the National Transportation Safety Board's investigation is whether co-pilot Rebecca Shaw and Captain Marvin Renslow may have suffered from fatigue during the accident. Testimony in the three-day hearing, which began Tuesday, indicates Shaw and Renslow made several fundamental mistakes as Continental Connection Flight 3407 approached Buffalo Niagara International Airport in wintry weather the night of Feb. 12.
Airline officials acknowledged at the hearing that Shaw, 24, was paid at a rate of about $23 an hour and had a salary of $16,254, although she could have earned more if she worked extra hours. She previously had a second job working in a coffee shop.
The night before the accident, Shaw flew overnight as a passenger from Seattle, changing planes in Memphis, to report to work at Newark Liberty International Airport. Shaw also complained about congestion and may have been suffering from a cold.
Roger Cox, NTSB's aviation safety operations group chairman, suggested while questioning officials for Colgan Air Inc. of Manassas, Va., which operated the flight for Continental, that Shaw was commuting because she couldn't afford to live in the New York metropolitan area.
Mary Finnegan, Colgan's vice president of administration, said the company permits pilots to live anywhere in the country they wish. She said the company also allows them to remove themselves from flight duty if they are fatigued.
"It is their responsibility to commute in and be fit for duty," Finnegan said.
Renslow commuted to Newark from his home near Tampa, Fla. Colgan officials said their captains typically have salaries around $55,000 a year.
A transcript of the cockpit voice recorder released Tuesday by the board showed Renslow and Shaw engaging in chitchat about careers and her lack of experience flying in icy conditions during the plane's final minutes, even after they had noticed a buildup of ice on the windshield.
The Dash 8-Q400 Bombardier, a twin-engine turboprop, experienced an aerodynamic stall, rolling back and forth before plunging into a house below. All 49 people aboard and one on the ground were killed.
Colgan officials acknowledged in response to board members' questions that Renslow and Shaw weren't paying close attention to the plane's instruments and were surprised by a stall warning. Nor did they follow the airline's procedures for responding to a stall.
Further testimony and documents also showed that Renslow had failed several training tests before and after being hired by Colgan in 2005. He had been certified to fly the Dash-8 plane for about three months.
Paul Pryor, Colgan's head of pilot training, acknowledged that Renslow didn't have any hands-on training on the Dash 8's stick pusher -- a key safety system that automatically kicks on in response to a stall -- although he had received hands-on stick pusher training on a smaller plane that he previously flew.
The accident was the worst U.S. airline crash in seven years.
Trip7
Well-Known Member
Not bad pay at all. Interesting that you wouldn't do it again for 200k. Must be hard work. No only would I do my job all over again, I think I'd do it twice
Food for though, at my regional airline ASA, after 9 years and assuming one upgrades, a pilot will be in the 100k range.
thepedroid
Well-Known Member
Is it just me, or does that sound like the FO makes 23 an hour plus the salary?
Trip7
Well-Known Member
Its just you:laff:
deek
New Member
I read all these posts and I see that having less people fly, or fly for less is the answer, and I agree. But as a student pilot working on my comm, and after I CFI for a bit, if someone with a RJ says I'm qualified to fly it and they will hire me, and it's what I've been going after, how exactly do I say no thanks, when I know that even if I did my part, they will simply ask they guy next to me, and he will say yes. It's almost a damned if you do damned if you don't situation.
Clocks
Well-Known Member
Just do what everyone else does.
Take the job, then later on spend time on web forums telling everyone else how your experience prior to taking the $19k/year job "back in the day" was so much superior to everyone else's experience prior to taking the $19k/year job now.
Trip7
Well-Known Member
:yeahthat::yeahthat::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:
Not bad pay at all. Interesting that you wouldn't do it again for 200k. Must be hard work. No only would I do my job all over again, I think I'd do it twice
It's not that is was a hard job, just VERY stressfull. It's a job, not a career. When a car comes through the service drive at 3pm that has 5 hours of work to be done (how long it takes, not what it pays) and the service advisor promises it to the customer at 5pm, and they demand that you get it done, it becomes stressfull. Or when the rent/mortgage is due in a week, and it's been a slow month and you have enough money to either pay the mortgage or put food on the table.... or when you do 16 hours worth of diagnostic work on a car that warranty will only pay you to replace the broken part (0.8 hrs pay), not the things it takes to find out whats actually broken.... or you have to spend 3 weeks away from home to go to Viper school, or Cummings school, or Sprinter school, or Prowler school, and they pay you $75 a day for those three weeks.... I could go on and on. I got into aviation because I would rather have my son see me do something his daddy loves to do, rather than something his daddy can just do that drives him nuts!
Money isn't everything, but it still means a lot. $16.5k a year and living with your parents is unacceptable for the amount of money/skill/time that go into being a pilot..... even if it is for a regional that is supposed to e a "stepping stone." Why take a pay cut from being an instructor with 1 persons saftey in your hands to being an FO with up to 100 peoples saftey in your hands. More responsibilty should equal more pay.
You may think that is funny but it's true. Most people have no idea what they're getting themselves into and the people that have made it try to warn the new guys. I liked the crack analogy. They know it's bad but they have to try it because they just have to. Even the thread starter asked about the low pay but later admitted that he's willing to fly anyways. It's just a domino cycle untill pepole can't actually get into an airplane to fly for reasons like money and avialibity. It's all about supply and demand.
Bignellyxx
Well-Known Member
So true so true. I say we call it, Walk uphill both ways in the snow syndrome
future pilot
Well-Known Member
I draw the line when i could be making more money at Mc.Donalds.(probably never) Actually i draw the line when i only have enought money to pay the bills. When i am not making any money or when im bareley makng any money
FWIW, most regional pilots DON'T make enough money to pay bills. Thats why flight 3407's FO was living with her parents and used to work at a coffe shop as a second job.
future pilot
Well-Known Member
Yea hopefully one of the good things that comes out of this crash is that the regionals realize that they are neglecting their pilots and pretty much treating them like animals.