baseball

I think getting their regional "relationship and priorities" in order would be a powerful attractant. But, absent that, I agree.

OOfff

yes, that’s what is holding many people at regionals for more than 4 years...being too big for their britches.

baseball

No, it's the revenue model and the fact that regional airline managements are forcing pilots to prostitute themselves. ALPA needs to force regional economic models into a different place. Once it becomes economically enviable those management teams and their contracts won't be able to produce the flights for pennies on the dollar. We've gotta force ALPA and regional airline managements into the right direction. ALPA is half the problem, and the other half lies within those block hour and flight completion/segment contracts. We can only affect ALPA. We've gotta get ALPA moving in the right direction. The sooner the better! For nearly 30 years its been AFU. Gotta fix it soon before it becomes institutionalized involuntary servitude.

OOfff

oh no, I was laughing at you telling your child that 1-2 years in each regional seat was a realistic set of expectations.

OpentimeVirus

I’m laughing too.

ReadOnly7

how long were you at SkyWest, JT?

OOfff

im not sure if you’re trying to doxx me with the initials, but they’re wrong. Quite a bit more than 4 years

baseball

That's part of the problem. I recall when there were 17 Year FO's at American Eagle in the early 1990's.

Spending more than 4 years at a regional is NOT the upward progression that this industry needs. It's the opposite.

Part of changing the "penalty box effect" as I call it is changing the fundamentals of the regional industry.

There are two areas that need change.

1. The model used to contract regional carriers
2. The representational model of the Airline Pilots Association

From a major (mainline pilot) dues paying member perspective, we need to change the relationship and priorities of ALPA.. If you go back and read why APA didn't come back to ALPA, the "relationship and priorities" were the two reasons why APA didn't come back to ALPA. That to me is a powerful and telling anecdote. It means they didn't trust ALPA to represent their mainline interests to a sufficient (minimum) degree. Change can either happen for the right reasons or not. When APA said NO, they were doing more than telling ALPA NO. They were drawing a road map as to where ALPA needed to go.

No one should be spending a significant amount of time at a regional carrier. It's contradictory to upward mobility and career progression, and it stifles your long term earning potential and career expectations. That's really common sense.

OOfff

wait, do you think people WANT to spend many years at a regional?

baseball

The issue isn't what people want. The issue is how to achieve it. last 20 years of the RJ representational and contract model shows me the best predictor of future performance is past performance. Another words the status quo will keep the situation in equilibrium (not change) unless something or things happen to affect it. A body in motion tends to stay in motion, or in this case, a body in motion going in a particular direction (vector and velocity) will continue in this trajectory unless influenced by some outside force or forces. The status quo for my dues money is not acceptable.

The best stuff to read on this is the notes and minutes of meetings whereby APA decided on what NOT to do and why.