good article on Repulic and its road ahead

[UnstableAviator]

The real irony here is that after the SLI, ALL flying in the RAH system will be done by pilots on the RAH seniority list. From Q400 to A320. If nothing else, RAH pilots will be the first with a chance to "take it back" in a long time.

 

[800Dog]

Dude, Airtran Captains make the same as their counterparts at DAL flying the MD 80. FO's are a different story.

Try and keep up with the context of the discussion. For years, Airtran/Valujet pilots made significanly less than the competitions pilots. Over time, that cost advantage was a major factor that caused pilots at the majors to take 30-50% pay cuts and lose their DB plans. It took bankruptcy to bring legacy airline pilot pay down to that of the Airtrans/LUVs/JetBlues. Now Republic is putting pressure on Airtran with cheaper labor. Not a difficult concept......

 

[waveflyer]

The real irony here is that after the SLI, ALL flying in the RAH system will be done by pilots on the RAH seniority list. From Q400 to A320. If nothing else, RAH pilots will be the first with a chance to "take it back" in a long time.

Wow. You're right- bc your pilot group is motivated to keep a SLI. And don't believe a turboprop is beneath them.

It's what I've been saying all along. Major airlines could do it- they just don't want to badenough to fight for it.

I think it would be a great career to have the option of bidding everything- turboprop to 777

 

[CFI2766]

Correct.

Deregulation was the ultimate cause of all this. With mainline pilots selling out Scope a close 2nd.

And I disagree with Propsync. Until pilots stop undercutting each other for the job, this won't stop until there is an outside force on the marketplace to artificially restrict the number of qualified pilots (ATP requirement for all new-hire F/O's, etc).


There is no financial motivation for an individual pilot to not 'undercut' each other. This is often misunderstood by people casting stones at junior pilots. After all, what do you want the new guys to do? Not take the job to help someone else have higher wages? If the new guy/gal doesn't take the job, and therefore the seniority number, someone else will. I'm not necessarily defending the junior pilots here, per se'. I'm just trying to dispel the notion that the decline in pilot wages can be laid at the feet of those who are unfortunate enough to be junior.

I agree that the industry needs an iron clad minimum starting point to ensure that it remains an attractive career choice for pilots. Unfortunately, the industry doesn't exist to provide an attractive career choice for pilots.

This is an unpleasant truth in the facts here: experience requirements wouldn't have changed the outcome of 3407...

 

[kf4amu]

If nothing else, RAH pilots will be the first with a chance to "take it back" in a long time.

Take what back? They never had anything but crappy pay and work rules in the first place.

 

[Lear70]

There is no financial motivation for an individual pilot to not 'undercut' each other. This is often misunderstood by people casting stones at junior pilots.

You're dead wrong. Sorry, going to have to throw a little perspective by someone with 20 years in the business:

This is often misunderstood by the junior pilots who don't understand the "big picture". The financial motivation "not to undercut each other" is for YOUR OWN top-out wages to be higher, later down the road, resulting in an overall career earning expectancy hundreds of thousands of $$ more. It's simple math.

After all, what do you want the new guys to do? Not take the job to help someone else have higher wages?

No, it's to help YOU have higher wages, genius.

Sure, you can take that $18,000 a year job right now, and have a 737 Captain topping out at $180 bucks an hour, or you can refuse to take a crap regional job at $18k a year, force the companies to correct their hiring and pay practices, and top out at $220 an hour for that 737 CA 20-year pay rate.

Waiting a year or two and starting out at $36k at a major flying those turboprops or RJ's/SNB's in-house and make it back by your 4th year and retire with an extra $1,000,000 in the bank. And yes, the extra zeros are actual numbers.

p.s. Yes, I'm practicing what I preach. I didn't sit right seat in an RJ, turned it down twice, and don't regret it for a second.

If the new guy/gal doesn't take the job, and therefore the seniority number, someone else will.

And that's the cop-out by the inexperienced to try to improve their lot in life.

I'm not necessarily defending the junior pilots here, per se'.

Yes, you are.

I'm just trying to dispel the notion that the decline in pilot wages can be laid at the feet of those who are unfortunate enough to be junior.

You're right. It's SHARED. Both by the junior idiots who keep taking those $18k a year jobs and the senior idiots who gave up Scope and keep doing so. I'd like to smack the lot of you upside the head.

I agree that the industry needs an iron clad minimum starting point to ensure that it remains an attractive career choice for pilots. Unfortunately, the industry doesn't exist to provide an attractive career choice for pilots.

Nope. That's why it's up to each, individual pilot to do what's right not ONLY for themselves, but also for the profession. Something doctors and attorneys seem to be able to figure out, but pilots, for all their alleged "intelligence", are frakking idiots about.

This is an unpleasant truth in the facts here: experience requirements wouldn't have changed the outcome of 3407...

Ummm,,, we weren't talking about experience and accident rates. We were talking about the industry, Republic, and pay. Wrong thread.

 

[scoreboardII]

Lear said:

This is often misunderstood by the junior pilots who don't understand the "big picture". The financial motivation "not to undercut each other" is for YOUR OWN top-out wages to be higher, later down the road, resulting in an overall career earning expectancy hundreds of thousands of $$ more. It's simple math.

Wow, how naive. The base reason this industry is in the shape it is is because of folks like yourself who sell this false hope of higher wages "later down the road". Thats called a Ponzi scheme.

If you make more now, you'll have more later, thats called time value of money.

What happens when the everyone is at that highest wage tier you speak of because of 5-10 years of recession? I'll tell you what, no company can make any money.

How about some reality, we are all pilots, pay all of us pilots a pilots wage.

Just like a Dr gets a set amount per service, just like a plumber gets a set amount per service, we offer a service, a flight hour.

For arguments sake lets say $125 is your wage from day one until you retire.

You get $10 more an hour to Captain, $15 to be a checkairmen.

If you keep your nose clean you get $1 more per hour per year with the company your with.

Thats how to solve this problem, not hide behind a false hope of higher wages 30 years down the road.

 

[Lear70]

Wow, how naive. The base reason this industry is in the shape it is is because of folks like yourself who sell this false hope of higher wages "later down the road". Thats called a Ponzi scheme.

Wow. How short-sighted.

You obviously weren't around in this career before the regionals got past a 34-seat Saab.

Hint: That's how the industry WORKED for DECADES. It wasn't until Scope was released to allow aircraft larger than 30 seats and, eventually, RJ's, that the slide down the slope of declining wages happened.

Ponzi scheme? Take a reality check on airline wages from the 60's through the 90's.

Wow,,, amazing so many people don't remember the past and are dead-set on "this is the way it is". No wonder this "profession" is so screwed up.

If you make more now, you'll have more later, thats called time value of money.

No, do the math again. If you make $18k a year for 3 years, that's $54,000. Add 3% COLA for those 3 years, you come out close to $61,000.

If you make double that starting your first year, but it takes 3 years longer to get hired because it's the MAJORS flying those aircraft instead of a crap regional, you make that back in 4 years. Every year AFTER that, you make more, retiring with HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS MORE, the present value of money incorporated into that number.

It's amazing to me the number of people who can't do simple compounded math. Maybe I can do the scales easier in my head because I REMEMBER when the pay scales were higher, as in BEFORE the advent of the "RJ", yet I flew for 5 years as an RJ Captain so I know what THOSE scales add up to as well.

What happens when the everyone is at that highest wage tier you speak of because of 5-10 years of recession? I'll tell you what, no company can make any money.

You don't run an airline when "everyone is at that highest wage". Here's a news flash: EVERY company has to grow. Southwest included. If you're not growing, you're not generating increasing revenue with new-hire pilots at the lower pay scales. In other words, if you're not growing, you're dying.

Which is why I have said for over a decade, and CONTINUE to say, that this airline model of deregulation is a FAILURE. Each airline reaches a point where they can no longer grow, with constant pricing pressure from airlines with lower CASM, then it stagnates and either files bankruptcy repeatedly or it dies. Period. The end. Thanks for playing. NOT rocket science.

The only thing the Regionals have done is prolonged that realization by our elected legislature by artificially decreasing CASM for an ever-growing percentage of Legacy carriers' operations.

How about some reality, we are all pilots, pay all of us pilots a pilots wage.

You talk about reality, talk about the inability to pay high wages, then say "pay all of us pilots a pilot's wage"??? That, in and of itself, is a non-sequitur.

Thats how to solve this problem, not hide behind a false hope of higher wages 30 years down the road.

Talk about hiding behind "false hopes"... you want to simply say "pay me a better wage", and ignore the economics behind it. Doesn't work like that.

Fact is, this system is broken. It's been broken since that idiot Kahn thought it up. Hell, even HE admitted, during his last public speech on the matter, that airlines would never be as profitable as they once were before deregulation, and expressed doubts they would ever be profitable again.

Here's a brief history lesson on the outcome of deregulation, stripped of anything pretty or the "right of every citizen to airline travel", which is absurd, in a capitalism-based economy:

http://www.columbia.edu/~lnp3/mydocs/economics/airline_deregulation.htm

The facts are simple:

1. You cannot raise ANY wages without raising prices. Regional wages included.

2. Ticket prices are not perfectly elastic. You raise prices, people stop flying, we lose jobs.

3. NOTHING is going to fix this industry without a cost. It's going to pinch SOMEONE. Either the flying public through increased prices, or the jobs that are lost when re-regulation decreases ASM's to the point people start paying reasonable ticket prices again. Period. The end. Pass the stuffing.

Those ARE the only two options to truly FIX the problem with the airline industry. You have to raise ticket prices. Either the airlines have to raise them of their own accord (unlikely) or the government has to step in and force it. Otherwise this profit/bankruptcy/profit/bankruptcy cycle will continue with an occasional raping of the employee group thrown in for good benefit. Again, not rocket science.

Since we, as pilots, seem to be unable (or unwilling) to regulate ourselves as the medical and legal profession seem to be capable of doing, and since the government, having just spent the most amount of money in the history of our country, are likely loathe to talk bailout of the most expensive industry ever to once be regulated, I suspect this B.S. will continue long after I'm gone.