Michael it is about time you made this.

Would love to see the whole documentary if anyone has a link.

Michael Moore: Pilots on food stamps. [VIDEO] (http://www.wimp.com/pilotsstamps/)

There is also a reference to this issue in Moore's book "Stupid White Men".

It's from a documentary called Capitalism - A Love Story

I'm actually watching a documentary about Michael Moore right now. An American Carol.

amishtechie, thanks for this link

In this piece Michael More has hit on an issue that is probably going to get worse outside of America in the not to distant future. I find that some non American major airlines are pretty much copying the tactics that the "bean counters" have been pursuing in the US. For Sully to say that he does not want his kids to follow in his own footsteps is a good example of the slow but steady denigration for the pilots image around the world. What a sad state of affairs.

For years now I think it is fair to say that the US had too many airlines although things are changing now with takeovers or mergers etc, (not before time) but the pilots conditions have also diminished with the "take it or leave it attitude" pilots are left with regarding their employment.

OK I am from the old school, I am first to admit that, but pilots deserve high rates of pay compared to many other professions, because of the responsibility they carry with them on a daily basis. One mistake and your out!

I detest "bankies" or financial institutions who do make a mistake (just look at last years financial meltdown,) get bailed out by the taxpayer but this year are already paying themselves bonuses but never having the responsibility a pilot carries on his or her shoulders, the safety of their passenger and crew.

Tima9x

Maybe a good idea if people plant this link on as many sites as possible... A bit like the Teaparty in the US but for the right reasons! :ok:

The link is not working..

Link is working ok for me.

Capitalism - A Love Story - is on Amazon but not out yet - you can be put on notification for when it's available.

This needs to be seen by EVERYBODY! Thanks for the post! :ok:
(link works for me)

A very worthwhile five minute video. Thank you Amishtechie.

PM

TIMA9X, agreed bean counters offering ridiculous contracts has caused the present situation. However are the pilots willing to accept these deals only perpetuating the cycle further?:confused:

I am from the new school. By this I mean I have been flying in GA for 3 years and I am now currently looking for my first airline job. I wish to advance my career but not at the cost of further degrading pilot pay packages (mine or others alike). Any thoughts on this would be appreciated.

Amishtechie

amishtechie, I am afraid it is the state of the industry, so costly for young new pilots to get into. It is possible that the industry will shoot itself in the foot, again, when people start to look at new careers with out the hefty start-up costs, they (the airlines) will be crying out for new recruits and offer training packages. It's the never ending story, running in cycles.

Bean counters v reality! Their crystal balls seem to focus on today and their own wallets. The future is never clear to them until someone says "Hey Mr Bean we are short of pilots, all of our senior guys are retiring next month":eek:

Michael Moore is the last person that Aviation should be aligning itself with. For a Trotskyite, he's got rather too many personal millions, made out of supposedly being the working man's friend. More like the Exploiter-in-chief.

Mods: Thats so cool that you threw this story down in the lower bowels of the Jet Blast forum! The Sully Sullenberger part is only the first 25 seconds. It's the rest of the video that is important. Did you watch the "entire" video before you swept it into the dustbin?

Ancient Observer: Watch the video before responding with some anti-Moore rhetoric. Fine...you think he is a commie...I get it, but the only exploitation here is the airline "exploiting" the pilot. Watch first, comment second.

Thx

lpokijuhyt saidIt's the rest of the video that is important. Did you watch the "entire" video before you swept it into the dustbin?


Agree 100% but we have to respect their decision or else!

Ancient Observer quotehe's got rather too many personal millions
how do you know this? Can't even find him in the top 1000 on the Forbes rich list. It's not his style.

Mods: Thats so cool that you threw this story down in the lower bowels of the Jet Blast forum! The Sully Sullenberger part is only the first 25 seconds. It's the rest of the video that is important. Did you watch the "entire" video before you swept it into the dustbin?



well at least it liable to get the message out here to non-pilots or did you just want the feel-goodies among the pilot community?

Somtimes its simply the publicity that counts (makes one aware)

Numerous sources will point out that Mikey Moore is worth in excess of $50M, and that he is a past stockholder in Halliburton to the tune of $100K or so, a company he specifically excoriates in some of his 'work'. He is by no means a 'little guy', physically or otherwise. Nor is he remotely objective.

I hate to say this, but just turning around a critisising Michael Moore for making money is a cheap shot in the current discussion thread. A better approach would be for some of you critics to demonstrate that there are no pilots on food stamps. If you can't do that, then no comment is better than those you have made.

The man has no credibility.
Whether he's correct or not is almost immaterial. Even a blind squirrel gets a nut every once in a while. The point is that he fails to prove anything that he sets out to 'prove' in every 'documentary' that he's ever filmed and everything he does is driven by his own personal agenda. That makes every single thing that he produces suspect.
Are there pilots on food stamps? Yep. Is he a powerful voice to change that? No.
I knew there were pilots on food stamps long before MM decided to let all of us know. Fairly comprehensive N. American pay scales for fixed-wingers can be found here, no guarantees to their recency.
http://www.airlinepilotcentral.com/
You might do better to inform yourself on the source of the information before swallowing the dose whole and being grateful for it.

Not sure if anyone has to "swallow the dose whole" really.

Grabbing a few valuable insights would be the intelligent tack.

I had no idea that there were US pilots on food stamps. Now I do.

Sorry Mr Lifting, without people like MM the world would be much more prone to "swallow the dose whole" as we are generally hoped and expected to do by our respective governments.

El G.

I would state that without documentary makers who make it a point to determine the facts of situations, we would be much more so inclined. So, I agree with you in principle.

In my opinion, MM doesn't fall into that category, he has all the hallmarks of the ideologue, and that adversely impacts his objectivity. Ergo, I disagree with you in point of fact.

I am still wrapping my brain around "exploited" pilots. Let's see they go to college, invest voluntarily in flight training at great personal expense or invest years in the military at risk of life, sometimes buy ratings required by their potential employers and they are exploited? Poor judgment about future career, major career mistake that human inertia precludes a career change, but not exploitation. No employer put a gun to their head to fly an airplane, in fact, quite the opposite; employer's offered wages is tantamount to saying, "go away".

Slaves are exploited, not pilot's who entered the profession in the hopes of being a rich airline pilot flying 9 days a month. And I was one of the "exploited" back when Carter's poll numbers were better than MM's.

Their have been loads of stories about F/As on food stamps, junior enlisted troops on food stamps--a neat publicity trick to draw attention.

GF

I've only one thing to say.

If the job you have does not pay enough so that you can live on the salary, get a different job.

This is not really rocket science type of thinking.

I did that...several times. What you're not taking into account, is that most pilots are have a love affair with airyplanes.


It was the best of jobs, it was the worst of jobs...to misquote somebody.


I was able to walk away when I was thrust into dangerous situations with an alcoholic captain. Nobody else would fly with him, and I was told to "appoint a QC, if I wanted to make accusations about a captain".

I was financially able to do this, most pilots are not. The problems was, I missed being round large aircraft. Little'uns just did not do it for me. It was like a love affair I had in my teens...couldn't live with her, couldn't live without her. Remarkably the same really.

For a constructive assessment of Michael Moore, the authors of this book ask Dude, where's your integrity? whilst writing a disturbing analysis of the highly organized, long term deceptions perpetuated by Moore.

Interesting that Moore has never challenged the established facts which the authors expose, in a court of law...

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51G8JNCKERL._SS500_.jpg

I did that...several times. What you're not taking into account, is that most pilots are have a love affair with airyplanes.


Oh Lord yes, I was very guilty of having a love affair with airyplanes. However, when I decided that I was going to be a professional pilot, I enter into this profession with my eyes wide open. I knew that would it take a long time to earn enough money to have a good lifestyle. While I never resorted to having to apply for food stamps, there were times I had no idea where my next meal was coming from.

In closing, I now look back at the forty plus years I was a professional pilot and have no regrets, except one.

That regret would be that I turned down a chance to fly for FedEx early in my career and FedEx's existence, back when all they operated were Falcon 20s. That was during the period that FedEx almost went broke and the pilots were buying fuel on their own credit cards.

But what the heck, you cannot make the right choice all the time.

Strange how people like MM are always shot down.

Pray tell, who will expose anything if it weren't for people like him. We're more satisfied to wallow in a negative situation and hence will coyly recognise a whole lot of injustices perpetrated upon us. We prefer the negative comfort zone.

Truth is always in the minority and we wish to be part of the majority.

QED.

No more complaining.

Hard to tell where it starts Mr X, But that kind of thinking is sky blue.

Welcome to clarity !

El G.

Hi El G.

If there weren't any source of information, we'd be complaining for lack of information.

It is up to us to assimilate the data.

Mike X, the "X" doesn't stand for Moore, perchance?

And food stamps isn't nearly as bad as some outcomes. I lost 3 friends flying checks and 8 more in tactical military flying.

GF

I don't think it matters wether this video was made by MM or not. The fact is it exposes the issue to the common public, who if you ask me are otherwise clueless and believe pilots are still very highly paid.

I'm certainly no fan of Michael Moore, and in fact think he has done great damage. But I applaud him for exposing the situation of commuter and regional jet FOs in the US who I feel are well underpaid to the detriment of overall flying safety.

It was always a given that one might have to pay their dues in a low paying job in order to work their way up to a major airline and achieve at some point a very good living. Well now, the job at the top is good, but not fantastic as it once was, and the stagnation after 9/11 has suggested many worthy pilots may never get to that major airline job.

Regional carrier captains do make a living, even enviable wage, and at many carriers the upgrade time can be short. But I continue to be amazed that good, smart pilots always seem to be available for the food stamp level pilot jobs.

Once, when I came back from furlough, a fellow student in my recall class, who had made a really good living as an electrician while furloughed, said, "Once you fly for a living, you're ruined for anything else. The pay doesn't matter." I immediately saw his statement as eminent truth.

In a market economy supply and demand rules.

The reality of life is that too many of us want to fly airyplanes (sic) and there's not enough to go around.

End of story.

Nothing MM can say will change that, unfortunately.

It is sad that to fly them well one has to be well trained and dedicated, and a number of my colleagues are good enough to do ok at it financially.
But these guys have left the starry eyed "I'm a pilot" mentality behind to work at improving their skills so they are always in demand.

I've been watching the rise of MM's crocumenteries ever since I was force fed them by Liberal Arts professors. Funny how the professors in my Sociology curriculum versus Poli-Science, gave me polar opposite grades, when topics of MM were debated in my papers. My Poli-Sci professors loved my arguments of inciteful journalism and the bankability of riding the "victim" story all the way to the bank.

If MM thought he could make a buck off the Conservative platform, he would. Problem is, it holds people accountable. They don't call 'em "Bleeding Hearts" for nothing. Moore knows he can make a buck and has placed his Dyson at a theater near you.

If MM thought he could make a buck off the Conservative platform, he would. Problem is, it holds people accountable. They don't call 'em "Bleeding Hearts" for nothing. Moore knows he can make a buck and has placed his Dyson at a theater near you.
Today 02:14

Inclined to agree with you C of F.

Having MM on your case is lethal, no matter how deserving.

His blatant misrepresentation of the "free firearm when you open a Bank account" story in "Bowling for Columbine" was reprehensible.

(and in case you're wondering, I do believe that one should only be entitled to a firearm if there's a good reason to do so)

The thing is, there's making an intelligent rebuttal and then there's blatantly exploiting a subject.

Then there's folks who can't tell the difference. :rolleyes:

MM is an expert at distorting the truth and portraying things out of context. :yuk:

Just to keep this fair and balanced, I am no Michael Moore fan, can't stand the fecker, but Canadian Bacon was one of the all time great movies!

(Sorry Dushan)

Michael Moore is the little kid who won't stop picking at scabs. It doesn't help, it's annoying, and one wishes he'd just get Gangrene and make the end of it.

Flying checks and teaching others as well as military have always been the entry gate, No? What other type of flying led to a Commercial career?

Mine. I was lucky. I got the bug, and wanted to eat/fly concurrently, so I bought an a/c (C182) got the license, and started a business. We called it the world's smallest airline. "Flying Fish". Was making good money when I got the "Land Bug". Sold the works, and started building homes. Long story.

I have my heroes. Con-pilot is one. Hank Evans another. Jim Graham, Andy Traverso, Amelia Reid, etc.

Also Anne Moore. A brilliant Appeals attorney who practices here in Northern California. Had the honor of working with her on two cases. She is smart, hard-working, and in every case provides the solutions for people who are desperate for justice.

I don't know quite what to make of her brother, the "documentarist".

I have yet to see a single MM fillum. To me, it's all advertising, a little like the world's most expensive visual Blog. Very self-centered.

Flying? I'm biased, I'd fly for free. Freedom allows for choice. Some pilots pay a carrier for the privilege of the title of "Cadet". As SLF, if it has Propellors, and I'm not flying it, I'm not flying. Hot pipes? Window seat, just fore of the wing, either side. That spiral squiggle on the N1Cone is like Heroin.

bear.

MM whether you like him or not is really not why the thread was posted in the first place!.

MM has done some good stuff and some pretty bad stuff but he revels in guys who complain about him, like many of you on this thread. That's the way he works, for every 10 who hate him 100 like what he does or watch what he has to say.

Probably the reason the Mods moved the original post from rumours to Jet Blast. The clip is not fantastic but does make some good points about the state of some sections of aviation. Sully said his pension has been cut by 40%. How do some of the longer houred ATPL pilots working for the majors feel about this statement?

Food for thought!

You missed my point. MM is the wrong guy to be associated with.

He might, and he might not, have done one good thing in his life.

However, for most of his life he has concentrated on making himself a multi-millionaire by exploiting the bad fortunes of other people.

I'd listen to Sully/ PB telling us how bad it is, but if MM is doing it, I want to know how much he is making by doing it.

I'm fed up of left wingers who are also multi-millionaires.

Ancient ObserverI'd listen to Sully/ PB telling us how bad it is,Sully/ PB That's who I listened to on this thread and PBs thread.
I suppose Oprah Winfrey should have done the story and everything would be OK!:rolleyes:
only joking.

That's my point!!
I'd rather have her do it than MM.

Oprah is a left-wing billionaire.

by:Ancient Observer However, for most of his life he has concentrated on making himself a multi-millionaire by exploiting the bad fortunes of other people.And Oprah Winfrey didn't make her millions the same way but only in a nicer way?

MM is more fun, and has nowhere near the money Oprah has, not meant to be a cheap shot at OW!

Now back to the thread/video, you must agree MM has a point or two!

One of his points is his head.

To me Michael Moore is one extreme and at the other extreme are his detractors, the truth lay somwhere in between...:ok:

Just to keep this fair and balanced, I am no Michael Moore fan, can't stand the fecker, but Canadian Bacon was one of the all time great movies!

(Sorry Dushan)

Bacon? I have nothing to do with it. Speak to Matari.

This thread shows why pilots get f@<hidden> over by management every time....

It doesn't matter that Micheal Moore has made the video. What matters is the content, but the right wing mafia just harp on about left wing bleeding heart multi-billionaires.

Vote Sarah Palin at the next election, then you'll get what you deserve. Muppets. :ugh:

Muppets? The Muppets got what they voted for this time around.

Rant ON...

Several decades ago, I was at a local meeting of corporate pilots/mechanics at KHPN (Westchester Airport Maintenance Assoc.), it was an opportunity to meet and greet. A chief pilot from a Fortune 10 company was speaking, looked at us in the back row and asked, "How many of you would fly with me in my DA 20 for free?" A load of hands when up and he burst into a ear burning spiel on how we were cutting our own throats, ruining aviation and wouldn't get the offer due to stupidity. Character building it was.


When I watched that MM video, I thought of that evening, especially when I saw the girl with $100,000 in college loans. Aviation just doesn't pay like that, it hasn't for 20 years. It is not worth investing that kind of money. My niece went to one of the 5 best law schools in the US for not much more, well 50% more, but is earning airline captain pay in NYC at age 28.

The newbies like those in the video are ONLY doing that job because they are in a "winner take all" casino hoping to be B777 captains. It ain't going to happen for them. It'll be a long time before the US majors will be hiring that big. They are stuck and have few "outs".

Sully was right, no airline pilot is advising his children to go into aviation. I feel sorry for Sully and Skiles because they were got in the industry in the last of the glory years. They were middle-aged with kids, mortgages and commitments went it went south and management knew exactly what a 50-year old pilot could give up. The 25-year old is just plain naive about his future if he or she incurs $100,000 in aviation school.

Getting a degree in flying is like a degree in driving. Please tell these young 'uns to blow the dust off that college sheepskin, see what their uni major was and pursue a career there.

Rant OFF

The last good thing Michael Moore did

PaLt_X6xmbk

Perhaps Barry could follow his lead?