Get ready for Age 67+

[list2002]

Understand that training is soooo expensive, but the cost for the gummers per amount they fly has got to be pretty high, plus double the currency training per year, plus the staffing nightmare with having to award seniority, and STILL staff enough under 60 pilots to the senior airframes... Some might argue majors would want to flush the old out and start over with a jr payscale roster, and desperate pilots trying to make up for the 5 year loss of pay (at least after they have them vote to break scope for a sweet bailout deal).
I don't think the majors will ever have a pilot shortage, but the regionals they whipsaw against each other and use to outsource our flying may have trouble in the near future. With a few contracts due or upcoming it may be in their best interest to keep the regionals well staffed via age change, but I pray nothing happens that fast. On my side they'll probably just park planes rather than hire.
Also possible scenario is not to raise age to INVOKE a pilot shortage to then argue and throw money to congress for letting mgmnts El Salvadorian pilot reserves unit (which is currently in training) to come in and fly for $1500 pre tax and free board.

 

[Dumb Pilot]

Which ostensibly means that the US can't be less restrictive than ICAO. We can be more restrictive than ICAO (e g have a lower age limit) all we want.

ICAO is an organization that serves as a forum for their members to come in agreement of the use of international airspaces and the rules they will operate across borders that is all. If one of their member nations wants to set the retirement age at 50 or 80, it is up to that nation regulatory agency to dictate the rules they will operate under.

 

[Bringupthebird]

It's as though you want to be dumped into Obamacare?!

No one will want to be, but the die was cast when a majority bit on the "Hope and Change" hook. Too late now.

When I use the term pragmatic, I'm not trying to complement you. I know it's not the best term. But you are far too accepting of satisfactory in place of actual improvement.

There is a better way to do a lot of things. This profession is backward due to the lack of worker renewal. Look at how advanced the aircraft we all fly have gotten? Compare that with how we go to work and how we are paid. It's reactionary types like you that are holding us all back. I'd like to help you do the right thing and see increase.

Again, you think that the historically high pay rates you nostalgically pine simply always were. That's understandable for someone with little memory. However those rates came about through the sacrifice and courage of pilots who reacted to the opportunity to fully exploit the power labor had when the balance was in their favor. Those conditions were ripe during the halcyon days of growth and market share capture. The cost of a generous contract was the price of admission to such a booming industry. That doesn't mean that the contracts were attained without strikes or the viable threat of them, but management's knew all too well the consequences of a punishing strike and that a cooperative CAB would gladly allow them to recoup such cost increases. So wages climbed.

You want to create that same leverage today when it doesn't exist. Leverage is not a matter of will, but a proper response to the conditions at hand, many of which are beyond the control of pilots. To give a physical example, the pilots do not make the lever, nor are they given a say in where to push, but they can decide how hard to push.

The pragmatist won't waste efforts with grandstanding displays that pretend to reincarnate labor's glory days. This is a career man, not a classic car show. We are in an industry that scarcely resembles the Golden Age of Airline Travel and it demands clear realistic thinking, and when appropriate, action; not the strident anthems and insults of those who really don't know the whole story.

 

[Flopgut]

BringuptheBird: I think you have Stockholm Syndrom. (I've told you that before I believe) You are only speaking to FAR121 domestic passenger flying. (It's pretty obvous you don't fly much international, or you don't go very far) We have a tough industry that rapidly changes, but the way you characterize it you sounds like you're trying to convince me the world is flat. I'm pretty sure the only reason you carry on like this is because you have just enough pilots below you, who's future you can deal on, to try and get ahead. That's your brand of pragmatism; Carry on with the old coping mechanisms. Don't flatter yourself and think you are the other kind of pragmatic with wisdom and experience. This has been too big a downturn to not have some form of boom after. The opportunities will look a little different, but they will be there.

 

[Bringupthebird]

For those who may not be aware, before you get too teary-eyed at Flopgut's "poor me" stories, remember that he has bypassed his upgrade in the past and is likely not even directly affected by the retirement age change. He likes to pretend he is on the side of the oppressed to garner either sympathy or popularity.

Hey, that sounds like someone using Stockholm Syndrome to control their victims! Bravo Flopgut, bravo!

 

[bluefin]

Parking all the 737s and furloughing 900 pilots probably has little to do with Age 65.

I posted years ago the numbers of retirements forecast at UAL before age 65. Those numbers would have negated all the furloughs even with parking of the 737. Therefore this age rule change, "#%&KED MY AND ANDY'S CAREER". Numbers don't lie.

 

[relief tube]

Gen,

Your almost correct, they are raking in way too much money for very little work.

Think about it..5 weeks of vacation, picking the best lines, and an occasional sick call, they are really working maybe three times a month and getting 300k. Would you leave?

you can't take that money to your grave.

So unless you want to heir it away and have spoiled kids who don't have to work for anything in life, instead retire and enjoy time at home, time traveling the world, time in an RV driving around the country, getting good at golf, fishing at your lake house.

Your job isn't your life. It's sad that no-one who said they'd retire at 62 ever did. It's a mixture of greed and not having a hobby.

 

[flyboyike]

ICAO is an organization that serves as a forum for their members to come in agreement of the use of international airspaces and the rules they will operate across borders that is all. If one of their member nations wants to set the retirement age at 50 or 80, it is up to that nation regulatory agency to dictate the rules they will operate under.

Which was my point.

 

[Fubijaakr]

Perhaps you haven't considered that airline flying IS someone's hobby. A hobby that pays $175K a year.

 

[flyboyike]

The problem with that is you run into a conundrum: Foreign airline Captains OVER age 65 will be allowed to exercise their licenses in US airspace. US Captains over 65 will be forbidden the same right/privilege by law.

Is that fair? You honestly mean to tell me you'd support that?

I can tell you what I won't support. Me stuck in the right seat for God only knows how many more years while Capt Fossil next to me keeps refusing to call it quits. That I will most definitely not support.