Comments on: Minimum-wage pilots? Here’s one way of looking at flight deck salaries

By: Fresh Airfare

Fresh Airfare — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 19:20:10 +0000

Remember to be extra easy on cabin crew on your next flight…times are tough for them too!…

http://www.icheapairfares.com/blog/2009/09/23/will-turbulent-times-affect-aircrew-attitude/

By: Jim Istok

Jim Istok — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 06:37:20 +0000

This is actually a very interesting calculation since you can multiply that number by the number of hours on a typical flight to see how much of the ticket price is being applied to the cockpit as compared to the rest of airline expenditures. If pilot wages are decreasing then where is the money going. ALWAYS FOLLOW THE MONEY TRAIL.

By: Frank

Frank — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 04:01:51 +0000

anne November 9, 2009 at 10:56 am
“This is incredibly misleading…
================================================

I agree with Anne.

PILOT PAY is based on “equipment” and “years of service/left seat or right seat:

http://www.airlinepilotcentral.com/airlines.html

By: DaveS

DaveS — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 23:51:46 +0000

I agree this is a very irrelevant statistic. My kid’s teacher, by this measure, is making about $1.00 per student-hour.

By: Michael Anisfeld

Michael Anisfeld — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 17:48:19 +0000

The calculation does not make sense. The key question is “what is a pilot’s wages/hour, including duty time when they do not fly”.

Attorneys and physicians typically charge about US$ 200 – 250/hour – pilots should get about this.

By: Alan

Alan — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 17:32:28 +0000

Pilot pay per passenger per hour of flight has to be the most irrelevant correlation for that issue that I have ever seen! Perhaps we need to pay the mechanics who maintain the aircraft on a per seat basis?

By: jlawrence01

jlawrence01 — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 17:15:34 +0000

When you see how little some of the pilots at the regional transport companies (Mesa, Comair, etc.) make, you begin to question how they are able to find quality pilots willing to work for so little.

By: John M

John M — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 17:13:17 +0000

This sounds so terrible until you think about the number of passengers on each plane and then you realize that the pilots still earn a pretty decent wage. Yes, they’ve taken hits over the last decade however they haven’t been as hammered as the ticket counter agents, ramp rats and reservation agents who have lost more as a percentage of their income and who had a small amount to start with.

If you divided their wages by the number of passengers per flight, you would probably find that they are earning less than 75 cents per hour.

By: anne

anne — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 15:56:01 +0000

“Pilots at Southwest Airlines and Alaska Airlines fared the best, making $6.09 and $4.14 an hour, respectively, while JetBlue Airways and AirTran Airways ranked the lowest, earning $2.93 an hour and $3.03 an hour, respectively.”

This is incredibly misleading…to say that pilots are getting paid half of minimum wage….absolutely not true! That is a :”per passenger” #. I fly RJs a lot…from a small town…on average, 20 pax per flight. So, 20*3.45 = $69/hour. On a “real” plane with say 150 pax , that is $517/hour. Many planes have many more passengers. None of this takes into considerations how many pilots are in the cockpit (2 on RJs, more on overseas flights, I think). You can make up numbers all day long to get headlines, but no pilot makes less than minimum wage!

If your concern is pensions they have given up, etc., say so!

By: donj

donj — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 15:08:39 +0000

Pilots are losing benefits + suffering salary reductions. But calculating a rate per pax is misleading + a waste of time. How about as a percent of their airline CEO’s total compensationn including current + deferred, stock options, and benefits…and throw in the golden parachute.