Since I started flying for airlines I’ve always known I would have to retire at 65, and I have no problem with moving over to allow younger pilots to get their noses “into the trough”, as someone put it earlier. What I do have a problem with has nothing to do with what happens in the USA, or Australia, New Zealand or anywhere else. My objection is the UK government deciding that the state pension which I have had to pay for since I started work at sixteen will now not be available to me until I am 67, two years after I am forced to retire.
If they were to make exceptions to that rule and keep the pension age at 65 for any professions with a mandatory retirement age, then I will be quite happy.
My plan always was to go back to instructing, but we all know that doesn’t pay so well, unless you do it as an SFI. It would be interesting to see how many TRIs in their thirties, forties or fifties who moonlight on their days off for the likes of CTC or CAE would be prepared to forgo that extra income to let over sixty-fives make a living....