A major airline in the US, which is not even the largest, has about 700 pilots on furlough.
The only shortage which has existed for decades has consisted mostly of what type of bias the crew hiring staff have, whether for mostly pilots with primarily military experience, or for a mix of military and civilian backgrounds.
The mix of pilots who flew three or more types of transport-category planes and are below a certain age can describe an artificial category of a so-called shortage, especially if they must have a 4-year college degree.
One airline, back in the good old days, had "no show" pilots missing on the first day of new-hire Initial Training groundschool with little or no notice, because of its limited and reportedly dreary selection of cities with crewbases
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