US regional pilots, the untold story

Tenger

Just thought to post this youtube clip:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JNJucTcuh-w

I think in relation to some of the comments on other threads about 'the Dream' versus reality it could be appropriate. I'm not claiming this will be what new pilots will experience, but it is a sobering thought.

I would also note that in Europe we have a tighter limit on safety and don't really have the same 2 class flight crew system than the US. However many things that happen in the US slowly make their way over to Europe.

This could be the future of aviation.

Another interesting read it this one on a possible new term/business model: It is called 'siloing' of airline functions. There was a blog written by Boyd Aviation maybe a year ago. It claims that the downward pressure on airline costs may lead to airlines outsourcing most if not all departments to the lowest bidder. We will then see no career progression in these 3rd party companies as they want to keep all costs stable so they can keep the contract.

Already we can see FR implementing parts of this theory with their 'self employed' pilots and 3rd party hired cabin crew. And in another thread we have seen what is being offering to the employees of Dublin Aerospace to allow the company to offer good terms to gain business.

Stovepipe

Hi there,
US pilots flight pay, below the major carriers, has been poor for years but it has the saving grace of having a huge job market in the sense of having a huge 3rd-level and 2nd-level for pilots to get a start in. Europe's lower levels are much smaller and much harder to get into, more expensive to train for and there is significantly less job mobility, ie, it's harder to migrate for a job in Europe than in the USA or Canada. Licenses are cheaper to get and maintain. Also, there are larger militaries/police aviation/fire fighting aviation and so on, open to civil pilots that don't exist in Europe.
Apart from that, all aviation salaries outside the majors are lower than Europes, by a long shot. What Ryanair and D.Aerospace (and Shannon Aerospace, no slouches when it comes to scabby wages) are doing isn't new to aviation or even Europe, it's just reaching a wider net than before.Conor McCarthy was doing it ten years ago with Air Asia. The amount of aerospace jobs paying decent wages is dwindling, in real terms.

regards
Stovepipe

Delancey

Things have a nasty habit of ' crossing the pond ' and I don't see why the lousy pay and condidtions does not creep into Europe.
Whether it happens to the same extent as the US is debatable though , I've heard stories of Pilots earning less than a Private in the US Army , of Pilots being entitled to Food Stamps , etc.

donkey balls

Having worked for a major US airline I know for a fact that our flight crew were/are one of the best paid crews in the world,Saying that other well known US carriers pay their captains $80k pa flying TA routes.
As for FR and some of their crew contracting via brookfield the contracting crew get paid the same as a full time FR crew members,It appears that mainly the transport industry in general(planes/boats/trucks etc) are slashing employees wages+T&C accross the board while some of these companies are posting savage profits:mad: at the expense of their employees.
As the saying goes pay peanuts get monkeys and it will allways come back to bite the employer on the arse.

Stovepipe

I met third-level pilots who were working second jobs, often burger-flipping, to make ends meet. These were guys flying piston twins or light turbines (invariably not in the first flush of youth) on either scheduled or unsched light cargo, into uncontrolled airports at night in bad weather, to try and chalk up a couple of thousand hours which seems to be the unofficial norm for getting a shot at the majors. They were always astonished at how European airlines accepted 200-hour newbies straight out of flight school. They were flying for scarcely above minimum wage and some of them looked like vagrants. I've also encountered engineers working for minimum in the UK, also trying to get a start in the jet airlines. Our industry is shot to hell.Try something else if you can.

regards
Stovepipe