We’ve been hearing talk about a looming “pilot shortage” for so long that we’ve stopped believing it. But I had dinner last night with a group of regional airline pilots, all in their mid-30s and all left-seaters on CRJ 700s, who told me they’re convinced a pilot shortage is coming. They might be right this time.
As you probably know, FAA rules taking effect next summer will require newly hired airline pilots to have 1,500 hours of prior flight experience – versus 300 hours during the last hiring boom – raising the cost and time to train new pilots at a time when pay cuts and schedule demands already have made the profession less attractive. Meanwhile, thousands of gray beards at the majors will soon start hitting the mandatory retirement age of 65 – which was raised from age 60 a few years ago.
Another new FAA rule, set to take effect in early 2014, will squeeze the supply even more by changing pilot rest and duty time rules. This is a great idea, of course, but the new rules will force airlines to add to their pilot ranks just to maintain their current flight schedules. Add to this the growing trend of U.S. pilots seeking flying opportunities overseas and the problem only gets worse.
The guys I was having dinner with said they’ve taken pay cuts recently, and if they had to do it all over again, they probably wouldn’t choose to become professional pilots. The cost of going to school is too high and the new minimum hours requirements would be a deal breaker if they had to sign on with an airline for food stamp wages.
The hourly requirements will be slightly less for pilots who trained through a four-year aviation university or the military (750 and 1,000 hours), but for the majority of young pilots the changes will mean being stuck at the flight instructor level longer and, for the university grads, the prospect of a mountain of student loan debt.
Supply and demand being what it is, the airlines, and especially commuter airlines, might be forced to pay starting pilots more and offer further incentives in the form of signing bonuses. But even then, they could find they have fewer takers than they need.
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"The guys I was having dinner with said they’ve taken pay cuts recently, and if they had to do it all over again, they probably wouldn’t choose to become professional pilots. The cost of going to school is too high and the new minimum hours requirements would be a deal breaker if they had to sign on with an airline for food stamp wages.
And you wonder why there is a pilot shortage....
Interesting topic. My "opinion" about Pilot Unions and experienced pilots is they're primary objective is the work on raising their pay. i.e. If newer pilots get a significant pay increase, surely they will demand higher pay also....sort of padding their pickets.
My belief is that more smaller new tier of commuter airlines to spring up. These commuters would start out by flying nine passenger aircraft that would be certified using a single pilot. I'm sure that sort of arrangement is in effect currently with Cape Air. Those co-pilots can be used also for other duties in addition to flying. WHAT AN IDEA? That will prepare them for the future they're after anyway...lots of cross country time in an airline type environment.
I'll bet a lot of older and near retiring pilots didn't have more than three or four hundreds hours when they started???
The big job is how to make them pay for themselves...fares will have to be high, but need be justified. After all, the days of cheap airline fares is over.
Herml
Again, my opinion the Buffalo incident situation was an accident in the making. I feel commuting be avoided at any cost, at least time and distance restrictions. I've seen, pilots like to "get in" their hours then get a week or so off so they can scout for better jobs. I say, the work week and flying time be reduced to no more than an eight hour duty day, with only about four to six hours of flying.
According to a USA Today article several weeks ago, the professor from MIT mentioned near the end of his story, that maybe commuter airlines go back to their roots, flying turboprops, even flying nine passenger aircraft.
Right now, there's only about three new ones coming out. The Evektor EV-55 Outback, the Reims rebirth of the F406, and the Tecnam P2012.
I hope they're preparing for orders to start coming in.
This whole thing about pilot shortage drives me nuts when considering current annual entry level salary $20,000/year and ATP license cost of $90,000; not mentioning the 1,500 hours experience. It is hard to see how this void will be fulfilled. Most of my pilot friends comes from well to do families that received a lot of help from parents before they finally started to make the proverbial “OK” financially. With the offer/demand marketing rules, things will have to change somehow; however the ones in the training business are not vested in the hiring business. It will be interesting to see what happens.
