> A typical rookie pilot who flies puddle
> jumpers earn significantly less than
> $50k.
The starting wages for first officers at
most airline affiliates/commuters is in
the teens to very, very low 20's. A buddy
recently interviewed at Continental Express.
He was offered $14,400/year to start. He
got an offer from Comair that barely broke
$21k. He's no rookie - 12000+ hours and
previously qualified/flew as captain.
Some of the unaffilated commuters make
the 1st-officer pay them for the pleasure
of gaining multi-engine and/or turbine experience. Some airlines now charge
prospective pilots for their own interviews.
Some airlines require that prospective
pilots pay for their own type-rating on the
initial equipment that they will be flying.
Note: a B737 type-rating would probably
cost $12k-$18.
> BUT, once you stay on for several years,
> you make over $2ooK as a Boeing 747
> Captain.
I think you overstate the case. If you
are hired young and reach the very top
rungs of the seniority ladder ... and
choose to fly jumbos internationally; you
can indeed earn a salary in the low 200's.
Not many pilots ever climb this high on
the seniority ladder.
Some pilots choose to remain very senior
on smaller equipment because they like to
be home every night, have weekends off and never be reserve (on-call). I have heard
of a few 1st-officers that have declined a Captain slot because they liked the
benefits of being very senior on their
equipment rather than the low seniority
guy on better paying equipment.
An MD80 captain with 15-20 years of
seniority working for one of the (pax)
majors is probably in the $135k range.
The non-union carriers typically pay much
lower wages. As I recall, a VJ pilot was
in the $45k-$55k range for a senior capt.
Still interested? Please remember that
you must pass a very thorough physical
every six months. Blow it, and you can
become suddenly unemployed ... and blowing
it could be for something that is rather
trivial in the rest of the population. (That
would be ... me)
Still interested? Your employer can fail or
be bought out. Will you have a job? How
will the seniority lists be merged? You
could go from very senior to very junior
overnight - think pay cut. Worse yet,
think furlough. Some of today's senior
captains got bumped all the way back to
ramp rat during furloughs earlier in their
career.
Still interested? Some airline execs should
be poster children for the Labor Relations
Hall of Shame.
Don't forget that you'll likely have the
pleasure of belonging to a union. Some
are better than others. The airline mgt
typically has the pleasure of dealing with
several unions - I think NW has 6 different
unions representing their employees.
-doug
CA/SELSI/MELSI/CG
(a substantive collection of FAA
pilot certificates and ratings)