There are certainly some very interesting opinions expressed, and being everyone having iq's of a decent nature all of them have merit.
t is in the eye of the beholder methinks. What i think though is the nature of SAA's competition is being ignored. They may be competing against 1time, comair etc locally, but they are in an international market which the local carriers knows very little about. Becuase of this you can never compare pilot or any other persons salary for that matter against that of the local guys. They have to compete on an international level, in terms of salaries and numbers(to be the devils advocate you are allowed 1000hrs in 365 rolling days, why not reach that??).
Pilot salaries are not the issue here. Total company HR cost is. The quetions are simple a)how does SAA salaries compare to the BA's,virgin etc of the world. b) if they are competing with the major carriers, in terms of seats per flight filled, salaries paid across board and aircraft operated, why the
ck are they losing money. the reasons may be as big and obvious as SAA's pilot salaries, but those need to be adressed, what the pilots are being paid are irrelevant provided that they are competative salaries.