AeroQuixotic
24th Jun 2023, 18:30
I am writing this post because I am in a dilemma right now. I am studying Mechatronics Engineering in a university in Istanbul, Turkey and am about to graduate in two weeks. I can try to seek an engineering job in the very cutthroat dog-eat-dog industry of Turkey, or could enter the Turkish Airlines Cadet academy.
Some background : I am sure most of you are already aware of the state of Turkish economy right now. For the past 5 years, the average inflation rate has been around 100%, going up to 180% in some years. 1 kg of ground beef was 10 liras in 2018 and is about 400 liras right now. You can pretty much guess how much did the salaries increase in the same period :) Our dictator is trying to keep unemployment low by artificially lowering the interest rates and offering state backed loans but it's a Ponzi scheme that will collapse sooner or later.
Turkey is not a very R&D oriented, high added value economy, so good engineering jobs are far and few in between, and competition for them is very high, and nepotism is rampant. The remaining engineering jobs are more akin to glorified technician jobs that overwork you and pay you a tad above the minimum wage. Work environments are usually toxic, job security is nonexistent, and since employers know that if you get fired you will probably not find another job soon enough to keep your tummy full, they treat you like they are the God's gift. Of course I could try to go for a Master's degree in the USA/Canada/Australia/Europe and try to legally cement myself there as an engineer, but immigration is a very financially and mentally draining affair and is actually pretty difficult and high risk as well.
Aviation(at least line flying) isn't so bleak here though. Turkish Airlines managed to make itself a significant player in long haul hub-and-spoke game especially between Europe and Asia and Europe and Latin America. The fleet has grown about 100% in the past decade and airline is chronically understaffed, if you do get hired, you get upgraded to left seat and wide bodies in no time(compared to US legacy carriers for example). 777 captains in their 30s are common. And piloting is one of the very few professions here that don't underpay you to hell, a 737/A320 FO will make about 4 times as much as an entry level engineer, and for wide body captains, it goes up to pretty high levels for Tyrkey standards, especially if they also have other duties like line and base training/check airman/sim instructor. Since Turkish Airlines has lots of foreign investment and USD/EUR income, it is like a safe haven from the storm that is the Turkish economy. Do note that seniority system doesn't exist here the same way it does in the USA, so you may still have to fly at 3AM to Iraq on New Year's Eve even when you have been in the airline for 30 years.
The cadet academy takes you with zero experience and puts you in the right seat of an A320/737 in about 30 months. The job is a guarantee, which is a great peace of mind. A lot of people don't make it through the entrance exams, language proficiency checks(English proficiency levels in Turkey are very low) or the medical examination(the conditions are much tighter than what the aviation authority requires, due to guaranteed job thing). You get modular training, and spend little time in the piston props and go pretty quickly to airliners. You start with around 140k EUR debt to the academy, which you can repay in 15 years. Yes I am aware it's a lot more than a lot of regular flight schools, I am sure a lot of it is "job guarantee surcharge".
I have been a flight sim enthusiast since I was a little boy, and I always sort of wanted to do it in real life as well, but until recently I used to consider a cushy office engineering job where I toyed around with SolidWorks, Excel and MATLAB for a few hours, wrote some reports and attended some meetings and went home with a livable wage, but that reality doesn't exist in my country anymore since a long time ago.
I am very well aware of all the downsides that come with flying professionally, but the compensation is too hard to ignore, especially when the alternative is just about poverty. What would you do if you were in my shoes, pprune members? Thanks in advance!
Some background : I am sure most of you are already aware of the state of Turkish economy right now. For the past 5 years, the average inflation rate has been around 100%, going up to 180% in some years. 1 kg of ground beef was 10 liras in 2018 and is about 400 liras right now. You can pretty much guess how much did the salaries increase in the same period :) Our dictator is trying to keep unemployment low by artificially lowering the interest rates and offering state backed loans but it's a Ponzi scheme that will collapse sooner or later.
Turkey is not a very R&D oriented, high added value economy, so good engineering jobs are far and few in between, and competition for them is very high, and nepotism is rampant. The remaining engineering jobs are more akin to glorified technician jobs that overwork you and pay you a tad above the minimum wage. Work environments are usually toxic, job security is nonexistent, and since employers know that if you get fired you will probably not find another job soon enough to keep your tummy full, they treat you like they are the God's gift. Of course I could try to go for a Master's degree in the USA/Canada/Australia/Europe and try to legally cement myself there as an engineer, but immigration is a very financially and mentally draining affair and is actually pretty difficult and high risk as well.
Aviation(at least line flying) isn't so bleak here though. Turkish Airlines managed to make itself a significant player in long haul hub-and-spoke game especially between Europe and Asia and Europe and Latin America. The fleet has grown about 100% in the past decade and airline is chronically understaffed, if you do get hired, you get upgraded to left seat and wide bodies in no time(compared to US legacy carriers for example). 777 captains in their 30s are common. And piloting is one of the very few professions here that don't underpay you to hell, a 737/A320 FO will make about 4 times as much as an entry level engineer, and for wide body captains, it goes up to pretty high levels for Tyrkey standards, especially if they also have other duties like line and base training/check airman/sim instructor. Since Turkish Airlines has lots of foreign investment and USD/EUR income, it is like a safe haven from the storm that is the Turkish economy. Do note that seniority system doesn't exist here the same way it does in the USA, so you may still have to fly at 3AM to Iraq on New Year's Eve even when you have been in the airline for 30 years.
The cadet academy takes you with zero experience and puts you in the right seat of an A320/737 in about 30 months. The job is a guarantee, which is a great peace of mind. A lot of people don't make it through the entrance exams, language proficiency checks(English proficiency levels in Turkey are very low) or the medical examination(the conditions are much tighter than what the aviation authority requires, due to guaranteed job thing). You get modular training, and spend little time in the piston props and go pretty quickly to airliners. You start with around 140k EUR debt to the academy, which you can repay in 15 years. Yes I am aware it's a lot more than a lot of regular flight schools, I am sure a lot of it is "job guarantee surcharge".
I have been a flight sim enthusiast since I was a little boy, and I always sort of wanted to do it in real life as well, but until recently I used to consider a cushy office engineering job where I toyed around with SolidWorks, Excel and MATLAB for a few hours, wrote some reports and attended some meetings and went home with a livable wage, but that reality doesn't exist in my country anymore since a long time ago.
I am very well aware of all the downsides that come with flying professionally, but the compensation is too hard to ignore, especially when the alternative is just about poverty. What would you do if you were in my shoes, pprune members? Thanks in advance!