Dear Dynasty22 /
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My answer to you is that the 1973 October War in the Middle East, caused a terrible crisis in the US airline industry in 1974 through 1979... I do not have the statistics, but I would say that some 20-25% of the entire airline pilot group got furloughed starting late 1973 (I was among those pilots). It only got back to "normal" and airlines hiring in the late 1980s...
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Shall we talk about the de-regulation of 1978... and the numerous airline bankruptcies, such as Braniff, Eastern, PanAm, which were major airlines. Also how many airlines were new, how many got out of business. Of the new entrants in the late 1970s, only one is succesful - SouthWest Airlines... Well over 20 or 30 airlines started, and disappeared within 2 or 3 years in the 1980s and 1990s...
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In view of your age (no criticism of your young age), ask your parents about the lines at the gas stations all across the country in 1973/74, gas rationing, even licence plates could buy gas on even days etc...
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You mention 100,000+ airline pilots... I dont have the latest ALPA figures, but 65,000 ring a bell to me for ALPA members, add to that near 10,000 with APA and 10,000 with the Teamsters... Funny is, in the listing of "active pilots" in the FAA pilot list that I have access to, I found my name/address/ratings, yet my FAA/ATPL has been inactive since 1993... So these statistics are not very accurate. How many pilot certificate holders are current, not that many.
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My young friend, you are certainly an airline enthusiast, and you know all there is to be known about airplanes, being a pilot... but you should have a look at the US airline history and economics since 1945... There were a lot of drastic bad times, sorry to say.
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You are enthusiastic as I said, and an optimist. I am the opposite. I see now the US airline industry from far away, and nothing appears to be good. Sadly, the chances for a young pilot to have a "great career" as airline pilot in USA are possibly less than 20, maybe 30% at best... another 20 or 30% will "survive" with low wages for their entire career, and nearly 50% will eventually abandon their ailine dreams.
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I have a son, he just turned 18 of age... He as a PPL, just finished his I/R and will soon get CPL and ME, doing his training in Florida. Under NO circumstances will I permit him to seek employment with a US airline, based on my personal career experience. Beware of USA and Middle East politics. There is another "Vietnam" in the making, but you would not know about that era... probably will have even worse consequences...
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I have a good friend with PIA Pakistan Airlines, that I trained to fly in jets many years ago. He is now a 737 captain. With his wages, he owns a little car and lives in Karachi, owns a beautiful large house, with 2 living-in servants, a cook and a maid. His standard of living is beyond the dreams of most US airline pilots, particularly those who are suffering the wages of LCC and commuter air carriers.
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A word about USA economy... In 1983, the US Dollar was worth 2 of the present day equivalent in Euros. Nowadays, a US Dollar is worth 70 Euro cents, in other terms the dollar is worth 1/3 of what it was 25 years ago. You want to be a pilot...? OK... but look for a career overseas, not in the US. When all will go to hell in the next years, the US carriers will furlough again, and gasoline at $6.oo a gallon will mean the end of the Hummers, and the large 6-liter-engine SUVs which I see all the time when I visit Miami... The only airlines that will not be affected (maybe) will be cargo carriers...
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Listen to a pilot who has spent 38 years of his life with airlines...
All the best to you...
Happy contrails