What Can New Pilots Make? Near Minimum Wage

WSJ via Yahoo Finance ^

[Red in Blue PA]

A widening shortage of U.S. airline pilots is spotlighting the structure of an industry built on starting salaries for regional-airline pilots that are roughly equivalent to fast-food wages.

The shortage's toll rose Tuesday, as Republic Airways Holdings Inc., one of the nation's largest regional carriers, said it would remove 27 of its 243 aircraft from operation because it couldn't find enough qualified pilots. The news, which followed service disruptions at other airlines, sent Republic's shares down 4.1% to finish at $9.45.

Starting pilot salaries at 14 U.S. regional carriers average $22,400 a year, according to the largest U.S. pilots union. Some smaller carriers pay as little as $15,000 a year. The latter is about what a full-time worker would earn annually at the $7.25-an-hour federal minimum wage.

Regional carriers are a key link in the U.S. air-travel system. Big airlines, whose pilot salaries are much higher, outsource about half of their domestic flights to these smaller partners to save money.

[Atlas Sneezed]

I think you missed the sarcasm.

[Moonman62]

I think if you look around you can find colleges that will graduate you with a commercial multi-engine rating, but not airline transport.

[Yo-Yo]

Oh please. Given the typical ratio of employees to CEOs in the types of businesses you are seemingly thinking of, it would rarely make a substantial pay difference to the employees.

My tag line applies to the first part of the response.

[lepton]

If there was sarcasm, I certainly missed it.

[lepton]

I’m pretty good at detecting the sarcasm and don’t make the mistake too often...glad to see here that the failure was mine and not yours. :)

[sten]

blanket statement is invalid.

no CEO worth his salt would allow his company to go out of business due to the inability to hire workers because of his own salary. of course, if this did happen... the CEO is horrible and the company would fail no matter what

[rocket002]

It can even go further than that. You may come out of school with 300 and a commercial and/or instrument rating, but you still have to get to 1500 hours for ATP. Then, they may require a certain number of those hours to be a particular class (single engine, multi-engine etc.). From there, they can still require further hours in a particular type rating (i.e. 500 hours in a 737).

This is why most of the pilots for the large jets are ex-military. They come out with plenty of hours and most of it could be in jet aircraft.

Many students graduate flight school then spend several years as an instructor trying to build flight time. It can get pretty expensive renting a plane at $200/hr to build time on your own only to land a job paying $20K/yr.

[bjorn14]

Yes, up to even a ATP written. A full ATP is where the 1500-hour rule comes in.

[Pappy Smear]

It is simple economics. They pay it, because they can. All the professions where the top performers get big bucks, can pay squat for new people to the industry.

Minor league baseball players in Class A ball get a couple hundred bucks a month. But they will make millions if they make the Majors. TV reporters in sub-100 markets barely make minimum wage. Same deal for pilots on the regionals. They will get paid 6 figures if they can make it to one of the majors. But they need hours in a plane to get hired on there. The regionals offer hours, so they offer squat wages because they can.