Airline Pilots in Britain's Top 10 Salaries

[fireflybob]

Airline Pilots in Britain's Top 10 Salaries (http://lifestyle.aol.co.uk/careers-and-work/britains-top-10-salaries/article/20080718073009990002?gid=5&country=uk)

Comments?

[A Very Civil Pilot]

It gives the average salary for airline pilots is £63,664. This will be weighted by the small proportion of top of scale Captains, TREs etc

The median salary, i.e the salary earned by most pilots will be alot further down the scale, wieghted by the large number of low houred FOs. Perhaps around £35,000?

[False Capture]

I wouldn't get out of bed for a mere £63,664 a year.;)

[underread east]

Just as I thought. My pay is well below industry standard!

[Golf Charlie Charlie]

""The median salary, i.e the salary earned by most pilots ""

I thought the median was the number at which 50% of the sample is higher and 50% is lower, not 'most'.

[TartinTon]

Err no.....the median is the middle number of a set of numbers arranged in numerical order

[757_Driver]

and most, if not all salary surveys, use the median average and not the mean average to avoid the answer being skewed by a handful of abnormally high or abnormally low samples.
That figure sounds reasonable to me from my limited experience within the industry. (bear in mind they said "airline pilots" not "commercial pilots"). If anything I would have thought the median would have been a touch higher.
Dispite all the pi$$ing and moannig that goes on here, this still remains a very well paid and very great profession - I have had the 'luxury' (!) of having a 'real' profession previously and now I earn more, work less, and have great fun. In fact I'm still struggling to clasifiy anything I do as actual 'work' !

[Ashling]

Yes and how many other professions require you to fork out 70K to gain your licence to operate and then fork out another 23K for your type rateing and all in order to earn a starting wage of @ 27K ? Thats if your lucky enough to get a job. Oh might as well add uni debt on top of that too.

Thank goodness for the military. Then again you get shot at these days.

Take all that into account and add the responsibility we carry then I reckon we are substantially underpaid.

[Spearing Britney]

I would have thought the modal mean might have been more use! ;)

[Time Traveller]

Actually TartinTon, GCC correctly describes the median. (and so do you)

"the salary earned by most pilots" - that would describe a mode average (the most frequently occurring number - a pretty meaningless average in this case)

pedantry over!...

[topjetboy]

The article implies that allowances aren't accounted for, in which case that figure is actually higher. A lot of other professions, of course, have big bonuses, expense accounts and other perks so our ranking may not be accurate either.
It's also worth thinking about the sustainability of our high salary, the world will always need and value doctors and policemen, will we still be on £65,000 in 30 years?
And while I'm at it, our salary has been based on us retiring at 60, now we can work til 65, our salaries may come down to refect this, you can be sure our DFO's are thinking the same.

[JennyB]

"Yes and how many other professions require you to fork out 70K to gain your licence to operate and then fork out another 23K for your type rateing and all in order to earn a starting wage of @ 27K ? Thats if your lucky enough to get a job. Oh might as well add uni debt on top of that too."

Oh poor you, could always have gone for another career, or maybe if none of you paid for all the above then employers would have to cover the costs of training.

However if that happened and anybody could get jobs as a pilot from scratch without having to spend around £80,000 to get there then it would become a real meritocracy, and not a job just for spoilt little boys with rich mummies and daddies who squeal that they're not paid enough money or respect.

Perhaps

[Mungo Man]

how many other professions require you to fork out 70K to gain your licence to operate and then fork out another 23K for your type rateing and all in order to earn a starting wage of @ 27K ?

Not everyone has spent £93K on training, i spent a mere £45k, now earn that amount 18 months after starting my first airline job and will be debt free within a few months. I expect to be earning the average quoted above of £63k within a couple of years, and I potentially have a couple of decades flying left to do.

Anyway it all depends on where you've come from before - I was a baggage handler before so this is the best money I've ever earned and it certainly makes life comfortable if not luxurious for me.

Don't forget, in BA there are 3400 pilots all earning a very minimum of £65k so that's going to sway the figures certainly.

[diamodel]

"Don't forget, in BA there are 3400 pilots all earning a very minimum of £65k so that's going to sway the figures certainly."

Before I say this, I am very happy with my salary and my job and the way i got it (yes i paid out the big bucks too).

However I just thought it should be known that not all of the 3400 pilots are on a very minimum of £65k and it's not hard to find that out. The basic for a new direct entry is about 45k plus allowances (up to 10k) but the brand new guys without experience are on about 28k plus allowances. There are a lot of them too.

So yes, BA pays well but it is certainly not way above industry average.

[BerksFlyer]

However if that happened and anybody could get jobs as a pilot from scratch without having to spend around £80,000 to get there then it would become a real meritocracy, and not a job just for spoilt little boys with rich mummies and daddies who squeal that they're not paid enough money or respect.

Because no one worked their nuts off to save up did they?

Keep your ignorant, misinformed comments to yourself.

[757_Driver]

"Yes and how many other professions require you to fork out 70K to gain your licence to operate and then fork out another 23K for your type rateing and all in order to earn a starting wage of @ 27K ? Thats if your lucky enough to get a job. Oh might as well add uni debt on top of that too."

quite a few actually. How much do you think it costs to become a lawyer or doctor these days? which is also why they earn so much. Broadly speaking in a free market how much you can earn is directly related to the difficulties and cost of entering the market.

I spent 30k on my training, and JennyB - apart from the fact you've obvioulsly got a huge chip on your shoulder about something - that was my money, not mummys or daddys, and yes I did work my nuts off for many years and take a few risks to earn that money.

If you want a safe, boring job with no risk of redundancy, no risk that relatively minor health problems end the career and no requirement to gain a demanding qualification first, fine, I've got no problem with that, but don't whinge then that your professions salary is somewhere towards the bottom of the pile.

As for the future, well it's easy to sit in the UK and suspect that the aviation industry with whither and die, however this obsessio with the environment, tax and rediculous security is ONLY in the UK. spend a bit of time pretty much anywhere else on the planet and you realise that the environmental issues are pretty much where they belong on the agenda, and the industry is thriving. We will always be in demand.
People like to moan about us, but when oxygen bottles punch big holes in the sides of aircraft, or the engines crap out over hatton cross, then they rather like the fact that there is a highly paid, highly trained professional sitting up the front.
Besides, at least all our salary comes from money earned in a competative, free market, and as such is beyond reproach, at least in economic terms. Save your villification for all those that "earn" (or should i say steal) considerably more than us with their snouts in the public purse.

[stev]

757 Driver

well said my friend :D

[Mungo Man]

However I just thought it should be known that not all of the 3400 pilots are on a very minimum of £65k and it's not hard to find that out. The basic for a new direct entry is about 45k plus allowances (up to 10k) but the brand new guys without experience are on about 28k plus allowances. There are a lot of them too.

Fair enough - I forgot about the cadets - are there very many of them?

[JennyB]

757 Driver,

I don't believe you were the one complaining, in fact you seemed quite happy with what you are earning

Berksflyer,

Berks part aptly named in cockney rhyming slang I have to say, certainly some people can save up to be able to afford the training, but cannot be denied that many are helped by their mummys and daddys, generally the biggest whingers.

[757_Driver]

but cannot be denied that many are helped by their mummys and daddys, generally the biggest whingers.

like many in this country you seem to be obsessed with this whole 'class war' thing.
However in my experience the biggest whingers (in any profession) tend to be those that have never done anything else, so have no basis for comparison.
I've got friends that are teachers who think their 9 month a year gig with rock solid pension and job-for-life status is the hardest thing going and whinge about it continuously, I've also got other freinds who have moved into teaching from industrial careers who think its fantastic.
ditto in this industry - ditto everywhere. Generally regardless of background and financial status.
I'm happy with my current job, lifestyle and salary prospects, mainly because I've spent 15 years on the other side of the fence, and know that the grass ain't greener, in fact there isn't even any grass!
Personally I don't care wether anyone used their parents, their banks or their own money to get where they are, whats important is what they do when they get there.

[Rananim]

Not the sort of job you do for the money...like a doctor..we do it for the view from the office.

[Merlyn]

After 30 years in aviation I've seen how we all got here, from paying huge sums of money for training, flight instructing for peanuts, even joining the military and allowing people to try to kill you just so we can log some flight time (my route). It's all the same.

My inescapable conclusion? Aviation is an addiction worse than heroin and we are all junkies. Nothing else justifies the irrational economic and life decisions we make to get and stay here.

We should all be in methodone clinics.

And I still like going to work. God help me!

[Ashling]

Jenny B

You do seem to have an attitude on you.

For the record I paid @ £4500 for my ATPL thanks to military exemptions and I do not have rich parents. I dreamt of being a pilot from early childhood and was lucky enough to have the aptitude and be medicaly fit. The rest came through hard work. I gross over 100K now so I'm quite happy with what I earn thank you very much but I still happen to believe we are underpaid. The military boys very definately are. Thats the market though and you can take it or leave it, in that respect you are right.

Rananim and Merlyn are right in what they say, it is an aspirational career. People dream of flying and because of this spend large sums of money to achieve it. No matter what we are paid many people will still do it just for the love of flying. It is that deep desire that Mr O'leary et al have been able to exploit.

In my experience many of the young chaps and chapesses I now sit beside have sacrificed a great deal and incurred significant debt in order to be there and have their shot at their dream. Way more than any doctor or lawyer I know and I am married to a doctor. I admire them for that. None of them that I know are whingers but then maybe they don't have rich parents! It is of course their choice but I do hope that the rewards are there for them when they are able to climb further up the ladder.

[skyepup]

"not a job just for spoilt little boys with rich mummies and daddies who squeal that they're not paid enough money or respect."


Jenny - So I take it that only the "boys" are spoilt? What about the female pilots? Are you going to make a sweeping statement about them aswell?

Sounds to me like somebody got dumped by a pilot......

Dont be so blooming narrowminded :ugh:

[fireflybob]

I asked my recently qualified first officer how much he owed to the bank - "£100,000" was his answer!