Piloting is highly competitive.

Post #333,255 by static 9/27/10 8:41:33 PM Reply	Piloting is highly competitive. I used to know a commercial pilot. Last time we talked about it, he was beginning to consider that he might have to change employers for the possibility of moving up in the ranks. There is just so little attrition up the top and the numbers of pilots the airlines employ is strongly based on how many flights they put on. Wade. Q:Is it proper to eat cheeseburgers with your fingers? A:No, the fingers should be eaten separately.
Post #333,379 by crazy 9/29/10 5:57:21 PM Reply	So? It is highly competitive because there are so few positions open (x amount of new planes hitting the air, VERY small), VS pilots coming out of the military who would kill for the chance to get paid to fly. Once they are in, no competition, because it is based on seniority, right? Not like they have to work harder or better to be promoted, they just have to not panic in the emergencies and sit back and relax the rest of the time. Occasionally, they have to train on a new plane. I'm not feeling sorry for them. I certainly don't think this EXTREME outlier should be used as anecdotal evidence to convince people that $250K isn't the TOP of middle class.
Post #333,392 by static 9/29/10 8:14:23 PM Reply	Correct. Commercial Piloting is far from a typical employment for "middle-class". Wade Q:Is it proper to eat cheeseburgers with your fingers? A:No, the fingers should be eaten separately.
Post #333,631 by Ashton 10/3/10 5:39:47 PM Reply	Best inner-view I know of piloting -- in a non-Pro pub: Patrick Smith of Ask the Pilot, regularly on Salon. His descriptions are lucid, his opinions are expressed with temperance -- and he probably Hates the same stuff any person now packaged as Spam-in-a-Can assuredly Does (Hate.) He also has periodic sarcastic broadsides on the cluelessness and incompetence of msm 'reporting' on ... about any air-related incident -- some of that fluff is mind-boggling in the obvious ignorance of the reporter about anything related to flight, to airlines or their crews' jobs/expertise and such. Maybe someday I'll fly again, but given present corporate and scaredy-cat/misplaced politico meddling ... it may be in a CartercopterÂ (and not a SpamCan with full Overide-the-Pilot-Windows-Vista-Egregious on board.) (Sheesh.. had that been the Apollo 11 hard-wiring: it would have automatically disengaged the crew pod for a return to Mother, aborting seconds before touchdown ... because the fuel gauge was 'dangerously low' etc. etc.)

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