I see five challenges to starting a long career in aviation:
1. The virus, to which we will adapt by vaccine, treatment or realpolitik. We are likely past the halfway point about now.
2. The long term economic harm that the global slowdown has caused which, like 2008, will take a long time to overcome.
3. Technology. Both the Zoom type of virtual travel which reduces premium cabin demand, and advances in autonomous (or semi, or remote) aeroplane control which the airframe builders are already investing in.
4. Climate change, which is going to loom ever larger as a damper on discretionary fossil fuel burn.
5. The biggie.The downward pressure on wages and conditions which we are just now starting to see redoubled. The invention of the LCC started the rot, and now airlines emerging from bankruptcy want to pay meagre wages which will in turn put pressure on other airlines’ pilots.
The days of going bush to bang around in a forty year old single are gone. No one in airline HR cares about that kind of experience. And who the hell wants to pay $140,000 just to starve for a few years against a potential future job which may not ever be stable or rewarding? My 30 year old sparky drives up in his Dodge Ram and speaks of just buying his second house. A lot of my 40 yr old aviation colleagues are wondering about losing theirs.
Last edited by Australopithecus; 3rd Oct 2020 at 21:27.