Originally Posted by
Brakerider
would you mind sharing some negatives or things you didn’t enjoy? As you said, this forum makes it out all rosy..
Of course there are negatives, here are some...
If you have no seniority, your schedule will suck. You'll be working reserve, weekends, red-eyes, what-have-you. But, it gets better with time.
First year pay sucks, particularly at the ULCC level. Spirit it $60/hr, and Frontier is $75/hr. Second year pay at both is roughly $120/hr, much better. There are no bonds for type ratings here, so this is you more or less covering the cost of your type rating. This practice is standard at more or less every airline/cargo here, it just varies by how much.
You can't go straight to a command. Doesn't matter that you were a hot shot captain with 3 orbital re-entries. You have to start as an FO, and do your 1000hrs 121. That's a pretty big chunk of humble pie for some, particularly if you're going to the regionals first, instead of Atlas, Spirit or Frontier.
You will forever get, "OMG I love your accent", quickly followed by a terrible impression of you which for some reason always sounds British. Learn to love it.
And lastly, my biggest pet peeves here. It doesn't matter where you go, but the supermarket bbq chickens here are just not the same as you get from Coles or Woolies.
Most of the downsides of the US are fixed with time and seniority. The rosey lifestyles and cash aren't something you get from the start, because you need that seniority to manipulate your schedule. The rest really is what you make of it. Some people will never like the US, and that's ok too.