It's a complex matter. Numbers needed to be increased, but the worldwide training disaster should to be addressed just as agressively.
Gretchen, I agree. This has been my point. I think a number of posters have thought when I refer to training it's to who is training the PPL, CPL, ATP. I couldn't care less who gives pilots their basic training at this time - I'm speaking about the limited scope of an airline looking at perspective employees (pilots). The only training that concerns me is the air carrier training.
I work for a regional airline much like Colgan, we usually provide pilots with their first airline job so many of our applicants come to us with no air carrier experience and limited flight experience (our requirement has been 1500h since 2004).
As a hiring company the 1500h is a nice objective limit to put on someone but in the end it means very little. Did that person really fly 1500h or did he just doctor his logs? Did he fly hard and learn the lessons we all would like people to learn in a C-172 or was he a pattern-rat that has never seen an emergency or unusual situation in his life? Is this applicant simply a moron that can handle an interview well? Did his instructors impart upon him accurate information or just make stuff up?
As the hiring airline I just don't know and have no way of finding out.
As an airline manager it's my job to be able to accurately assess their skills and hone them to be homogenous with company procedures, policies, and safety requirements. All that comes from an air carrier's training program. The airline training and checking is the only means by which a company can assure only qualified individuals are placed in those two front seats. As it stands now this training and checking lacks in its standards and effective execution. While this is less true for major airlines, regional airlines encounter the greatest challenges because their pilots typically lack practical experience. Even at 1500h a fresh applicant does not have sufficient experience to serve as a flight crew member. That's why this number is absurd and that is why the air carrier training program is the real issue at hand regarding these under qualified pilots. Unless we only hire military pilots or Part 135 pilots (of which there are insufficient numbers to fill the required staffing of the US's regional airlines) the regionals will have to take a part of the burden for the shaping of their pilots into professional pilots. That is what should be addressed by the FAA.
I think AQP and the upcoming changes to Subpart N and O will help standardize airline training and checking, but the FAA needs to perform more aggressive audits of training procedures. A culture will eventually have to develop in companies where training of aircrew is not seen as a needless waste but an investment in safety just like preventive maintenance.
Until the FAA addresses the core problem - air carrier training programs, specifically for regional airlines - all we'll get is ineffective band aids like this ATP requirement.