Mercenary Ali,
Regarding your 13th November posting - I served a four-year aircraft engineering apprenticeship. Obviously, due to the fact that I was learning the skills needed to maintain aircraft to the required standard both in the classroom and on the shop-floor, I was not 100% productive towards maintenance targets, profits for the company etc. Additionally, the very nature of the beast dictated that my apprentice-master would have to show me how to perform certain tasks, answer any of my queries and recover the odd balls-up thus reducing his or her productivity. To recover some of that lost profit the company paid me a pittance for four years, and I accepted this knowing that on my first day, post-apprenticeship, I would be getting a proper wage to reflect the fact that I was fully trained and able to attain productivity targets set by the company.
After many pleasurable years in the maintenance side of aviation, I am now embarking on a journey to a long-cherished dream, and am about to start on an ATPL course. As far as I am concerned the ATPL course is just another apprenticeship for me to go through, the only difference being that instead of learning how to ensure aircraft are fit to fly, I'll be learning how to fly them safely and efficiently. So, Mercenary Ali, if I am lucky enough to be able to put my bum down on the right-hand seat one day, I will do so knowing that I have served my apprenticeship and that I have earned the right to the same licence as the person sat next to me, albeit my one would still be frozen, and would expect to be paid commensurate with the skills, and hence profit-making potential, I bring to the company. Sure, you can argue that I have so much more to learn, but as far as I am concerned this is not an apprenticeship - this is called EXPERIENCE, and it is something that everyone in the cockpit is subjected to and learns from and is not finite. The captain next to me will still be learning, but that does not mean he/she shouldn't earn an attractive wage and, indeed, it doesn't, and I believe they earn every penny of it as they are ultimately responsible for the safety of the aircraft in its entirety. Why you expect this to be so for first officers I don't know as they are an essential part of a team, and are also subjected to a very high workload and responsibility. This is especially pertinent when you consider the market now dictates that the vast majority of fATPLs will be self-sponsored. With the total cost of obtaining the fATPL ranging from £50-100,000, it is a cost that many fine men and women are not willing to risk, especially when they look at depreciating starting salaries and how long it would take to pay off loans, and it is no longer as attractive a career compared with the many better paid alternatives. And don't reply with 'we don't want people who are in it for the money' because intelligent people will always want to be paid realistically for what they do. I will find it a bitter pill to swallow if I start my professional pilot career on less money than I did as an engineer, ten years prior, but I have a horrible feeling this is what will happen. The way starting salaries are going I'm afraid that the prerequisite for future pilots will be one of the following: (a) have lots of money, thus ruling out many from poorer backgrounds who would potentially have made brilliant pilots (b) have balls of steel ( ladies excepted) to borrow an unbelievable amount of money, which you may not be able to pay back, on the off-chance you may get to enter a very unstable industry - balls of steel could severely affect trim!!! or (c) sheer ignorance of the costs and inherent risks involved in a flying career - and I sure as hell don't want to be flying with an ignorant pilot, and I'm sure, Mercenary Ali, neither would you.
Regards,
VC10 Rib22
