USA Pilot Shortage

[pilotusa]

Ignition Override wrote:
If the US allowed more foreign pilots in with some sort of work visas etc or the airlines paid a good bit more for FOs, more experience would be available, but I have no idea at all how the process works.

While I agree that whichever airlines throw more money at pilots will get the most experienced, I fail to see how this will make more experience available. The industry as a whole cannot "buy" experience. Experience takes time, not money.
Bottom feeders like Mesa will be out of business in short order because of the way it treats its pilots. The CEO of that company used to brag/needle his new hire pilot classes by saying that he was obviously overpaying his pilots because everyone showed up for the indoctrination. I'll bet he's not so smug now. I bet he will be even less so when he finds he has to pay leases on a fleet of RJs that are just sitting idle because pilots no longer need his crappy company. I hope he's terrified; he certainly deserves to be out of business.
Someone posted previously that he had tried to get hired in Canada at 30+ companies to no avail. That does not mean that pilots are plentiful. The situation in Canada may not be as tight as the USA, or there may be other factors keeping him from getting hired (even as an agent.) I would reevaluate my interview skills if I were him.
At any rate, the pilot shortage in the USA is real. It's been hinted at for decades and was always "just around the corner." The fact is that the plethora of pilots trained by the US military up until the mid-1970s have begun to retire in the past few years. Civilian flight training gets ever more expensive and prospective pilots are just looking at the cost to train versus the future paycheck earned and realizing that becoming a professional pilot is really a bad deal. In terms of real purchasing power, the top tier captain at a major US airline is being paid the salary that his/her predecessors were being paid in the 1960s! Even in terms of numerical dollars, the hourly rates are from the mid-1980s. Flight schools here are shuttering their doors by the dozens as oil prices, aircraft costs, security concerns and lack of flight instructors makes profitable business impossible.

[poorwanderingwun]

Messerschmitt There is no shortage.

I finished in Canada and even tho I have 105 hrs, I went to over 30+ companies offering myself even as ground crew to get my foot into industry and all of them turned me down saying they already have tons of resumes on hold.

Shortage my arse.

105 hrs. ?.. Was that a typo ? What sort of licence do you get with 105 hrs ?

[White Owl]

He's right. They have tons of resumes from pilots who don't meet minimum qualifications. His is one of them.

[JetA]

105 hours !!!!

Come on, Everyone knows that the airlines don't hire until you have at least 108 hours.

Go rent a C150 for 3 hours then re apply