Pilot shortage - myth or reality?
 

Dear Members of the forum,

After a handful of applications being rejected for myself and my colleagues, after meeting numerous jobless pilots during the airline interviews, I am trying to understand, how it is possible that the industry experiences the shortage of pilots, even though there are loads of licence holders ready to fly and unable to get a position. Hence, after many thoughts I would like you (newbies and experienced pilots) to express your opinions about the pilots' shortage issue. Is it real? Does the airline industry actually needs that many pilots? Or is it just a campaign induced by the airline industry, flight training organisations and aircraft manufacturers to support their revenue by increasing number of pilots trained and reducing their wages at airlines?

As far as the US goes, I remain a skeptic about the whole shortage notion. There's admittedly pressure on the system in spots; that's not a shortage.

But, we're all largely The Blind Men and the Elephant on the subject.

I get the impression that Europe is also flush with aspiring pilots.

Every pilot on earth began as a 200 hour-ish pilot; not one is born with 10,000 hours large airplane PIC time.

The industry may have to reconsider how those new pilots get from new to experienced but there'll be plenty of aspirants for the industry to bring along.

I suggest the problem lies with the calcified thought processes of the industry itself.

No shortage
 

When you are in a job there seems to be a complete shortage as everyone needing people, once out of a job there is no shortage and nobody hiring.

reality.
I found a job, on jet, I would never have found one in 2008 or so...date where I finished my training and was unemployed.
So it is a reality.
Good luck

There is no shortage and there never ever has been one. Myth.

Unfortunately, simply holding a licence does not necessarily equate to being a fit for the position on offer. I think it has been said a lot... it's not a "pilot shortage"... it's an "experienced/skilled pilot shortage". I know where I am, they stated during the interview and during initial training that while they really really really needed pilots, they had not, and would not, lower their standards.

So, despite the jokes to contrary, airlines in general, require a lot more than "a licence and a pulse"... Unfortunately, in a place like Europe where recruitment of 200 hr pilots onto jets is seen as the "norm"... it's ridiculously easy to get the 200hr part, not so easy to get the "what the airlines want" part. So you end up with a lot of 200hr pilots, a lot of whom cannot get jobs as this particular market is saturated and/or they simply don't have the other qualities that airlines are looking for.

Elsewhere in the world, where things like 1000+ TT for a regional turboprop job is the "norm", there is more of a shortage because, while it is still easy to get the 200hr part (pay your money, do your flight training), it isn't so easy to get the other 800+ hours... and on top of that, the airlines generally want "quality" 800+ hours... like ATO or Turbine or Multi time.

And even if you manage to crack the hours... airlines still want the other things like personality, attitude, ability to cope under pressure etc... I know several experienced guys who were unsuccessful at interviews.

Hence, what the most of you are saying, airlines need pilots with some experience. That is totally understandable as you will find no company in the industry willing to spend money on their employees. However, the airline industry is different as young pilots need a significant investment in their training, whether for ab-initio or type-rating. And this is where the hindrance exists. If there is a guarantee of a position after training, the investment is reasonable. But now the issue is that you are not guaranteed of anything. Thus, the question is how to stop the industry pulling the wool over young pilots' eyes? Moreover, how to stop the industry looking at young people as cash cows? The picture of a pilot job as almost a royal privilege with money raining was created during the decades, but now it looks just like a Ponzi scheme, where the young people are buying uncertainty rather than choosing another careers with less investment.

Yes, I agree a giant pyramid or ponzi scheme.
I have said the same. no light at end of tunnel
IF I apply for a FO job on a GV and they want 3000 TT and 500 hours on a jet
and I only have 200 hours multi piston time and they reject me. OK fine
but when I have applied for many jobs for FO on a ce500 and they want
1500 TT and just 100 multi and then they reject me (happened many times)
they should not cry about not being able to find pilots. Ive even written a letter
to FAA OKC explaining who I applied to and what I offer in terms of experience
and licenses etc and am not able to find a job. I did that so if any of these
airlines 121 or 135 cry to FAA about not being able to find pilots the FAA can
counter their claims by using me as an example ! Fortunately I have a cfi job
in california training mainly chinese students and some indians. the chinese
students get free ride 0 to a320 fo job ! the company pays all their training
, food, housing etc.me 80k in all my training, study, hard work. i dont expect anything
from anyone but dont cry about a pilot shortage when i applied to your airline
and you didnt even bother to reply or you told me to spend 65 dollars on some
airline apps web site. im not spending money time just to apply for a job!

Interesting one. I have lived through several projected "pilot shortages” and they seemed similar to other shortages, like water and food, where the underlying problem was distribution rather than an absolute lack of resources. There is also the issue in our market where one unemployed pilot = surplus but one less than required = cancelled flights, plus the fact that aircraft manufacturers are always extremely bullish about future demand/production, which drives a lot of the “we need X more pilots in the next Y years” stuff.

Things *may* be a little different this time round as there will be significant numbers of the most experienced pilots leaving the industry in the coming decade - you can tell a slight squeeze is happening already as for the right candidates, some of the contracts in places like China are having the T&Cs ramped up considerably. This doesn’t immediately help those down at the 200hr level but it is an encouraging sign.

Back in the day, there were three main routes into the airlines: self-improver/GA, military and airline sponsored. Now, it’s much more difficult/expensive to come in by the hours-building route, the militaries have been sucked almost dry and most airlines have got greedy and let private concerns make a “product” for them. The last item I think will be the most problematic as it has divorced supply from demand: as long as they’re making money the schools are happy to churn out pilots but that is constrained to those who are able to pay for it in the first place. There are rumours of some carriers starting up cadet schemes but the lead times from having the idea to someone qualified and sitting in the RHS are long.

The final problem is that being a somewhat cyclical industry, historically the growth/shrinkage of airline capacity has been rather out of phase with pilot supply, in that you train up a load of pilots and by the time they’re ready to do the jobs they aren't there any more...

A few years ago I attended with my son a British Airways presentation re recruitment of young guys and girls to become pilots.
" Hands up who wants to be a pilot" got the obvious response.
" We are not recruiting pilots!!! We are looking for people who can manage a team. They will then be trained to fly."

My salary doubled as a BE99 PIC. My company pays BE1900 captains now 100k/yr. These are entry level gigs, 1,200h TT. Looking at the regionals, making 60k 1st year isn't bad either, or Delta, Southwest, their Captains are making bank, same for their F/Os.

"The ‘pilot shortage’ debate is an oversimplified way to brand the ‘coverup’ of many structural problems in the industry."

That's a really good article and supports my notion of "...the calcified thought processes of the industry itself.".

Indeed. Currently experience that myself. My current employer decided to hire quite a few number of ex captains, that passed the DEC process and then put them in the right seat. Due to its extremely long winded and calcified structures they will not be captains again, either for quite a few years, or forever with that outfit. Therefore, any notion of having a shortage even of qualified and experienced pilots seems to be completely bogus. Now, why do those individuals stay there? Simply, the conditions are still better than with other outfits and the quality of life wins in the end.

A good article. It seems to justify the approach of 'Aviation Universities' like Purdue and Embry Riddle where flying is a 'lab' in the degrees awarded. So the more rounded aviation education is provided to bachelors or masters level as 'just another' STEM subject.

It took me 3 years to get my first job, on a single piston. That lasted a few months. After that 2 and a half years later and I got a short gig on a multi turboprop. Another 1 year 10 months in-between jobs I managed to get on a slightly bigger turboprop. That lasted for about 1 and a half years. All the jobs up to that point paid less than $1000 a month. Now finally I'm on a modern jet airliner earning decent money.

There is a massive shortage for experienced crew. For low time guys/gals bite the bullet and keep pushing for that break, or call it a day and throw in the towel.

In demographics is destiny.
The reason why four or five generations of pilots have not seen a shortage is because this one has not been experienced before.

https://www.faa.gov/data_research/av...en_statistics/


With staggering entry costs, a narrow skill band, restrictive state rules and limited employers, the employers had the upper hand with unlimited supply a cornerstone element of their model.
.Acceptance and rejection rates for new hires, and incumbent pilots was all factored on the ASSUMPTION that there existed sufficient additional supply.

Normally the business cycle sees the hiring patterns and processes re-supplied the entry level with fresh applicants. As the retirement rate continued rising, the industry model, mostly adversarial, was simply not equipped to recognise and ultimately address with changed input prices resulting from localised shortage: They continue to try to drive down terms and conditions, for that is what they always did.

From the Forbes article below, the problem the industry faces is that the recruitment, training and promotion paths, indeed the very infrastructure in which this upgrade throughput occurs cannot cope with such a roll-off of experience from the top of the experience pile. It has not been seen before, thus the industry is ill equipped to deal with it. Leaving aside the Boeing projection' of growth, which, after all is marketing, the retirement rate alone is staggering and a function of date of birth. That it represents 50% of all airline pilots in North America is making airlines notice!

https://www.forbes.com/sites/marisag.../#cf3aedc15492

The looming demographic shortage purely due to the airlines allowing an age 'bulge' in their pilots, is one of the reasons for the pressure for reduced or remote pilots - with autonomous aircraft. There literally may be no other way of keeping some air carriers running.

Automated aircraft?
With the pied piper at Tesla promising driverless cars, last year, this year and apparently us all living on Mars by 2020, one needs look a little beyond the marketing

https://www.theguardian.com/technolo...-mountain-view

Perhaps before pilots scare themselves, the normal market clearing mechanism will likely become more obvious; improvements in terms and conditions will induce more supply.

There may be a shortage of (people willing to go 100k into debt for entry level jobs)

If an experienced Airbus Captain/FO , wants to join , say Ryanair, they pay for the rating to work there.
If a similar experienced Boeing Captain/FO wants to join easyjet, they pay for their rating to work there.

If an experienced Airline Captain joins a legacy carrier, they start at the bottom.

Companies now want pilots ready trained, on a plate. So who's actually doing the training?
Ultimately, its the individuals themselves, at some point.

Therefore, there's no shortage of experienced crew, simply its not appealing to now change employer with the constraints of the modern
day recruitment processes and associated financial terms placed on accepting employment.

To Ensure its Planes have Pilots, Airbus is opening its own flight academy.

This job has simply become not appealing. Who the fiuck wants to spend 90 hours a month in flying tube for half of the money that once was made spending on it half . The life style money career path , beside legacy carrier and not all of them,, just sucks.

In the decades after WWII, you got trained by the military and moved to the airlines when your time was up. As previously noted, the military has cut way back on flying and training pilots. Last Summer I bumped into a squadron full of C-17 pilots hiking Logan Pass - all in their 20s with about 200 hours. Bottom line the military can turn out highly capable complex jet pilots in under 200 hours.

Then there was the time when civilian flight training was affordable for the wages on offer to younger folk. Your first job would get you out of your parents' basement and pay for flying. You could then instruct until the next step on the ladder opened up. Much less of that now.

The shortage is of people ready and able to plunk down $100,000+ on a lottery ticket for a long internship in a crap job on starvation wages that may or may not lead to a half decent job.
​​​​​

That was not universally the case. In Europe it was airlines training their cadets largely inhouse right from the street in abinitio programs. Which lead eventually to the Lufthansa-developed MPL program that has been ICAO adopted quite a few years ago. The military was at best an additional source, but not the main one. However, both, the airlines and the military used a similar initial selection and training style, assuring a certain quality of trainees. Those selections still exist, however, the cost of the training has now been transferred from the airlines to the applicants.

Hi
I find the facts interesting , something that is hard to come by these days.
The FAA" Estimated Active Airmen Certificates Held" table is very good.
From what gather there was 270 000 ATP and Commercial pilots in 2009.
As low as 254 000 in 2016.
And 262 000 as of December 2018.
I am just using the Fixed wing ATP and Commercial column only.
I would imagine from this there less pilots available for more jobs!
Crisis , not yet.
What I would love to know is the age groups of those ATPs
Regards
Cpt B

Table 13 from this link for each year ?

https://www.faa.gov/data_research/av...en_statistics/

As someone with 30 + years working in commercial aviation I can safely say I have never seen so much movement and so many opportunities for low time new entrants. However IMO I have also never seen such low levels of skill in new hires flying serious iron. Historically new pilots either worked their way up through the GA or 3rd level commuter school of hard knocks or came out of a gold plated airline run cadet program with a high entry bar and a very high level of training quality ( essentially the model that allows the Military to safely and effectively put a 300 hr pilot in a fighter jet).

Now in Europe there is essentially no GA and everyone comes out of an airline puppy mill where ability to pay is the main entry bar.

In Canada there is a real GA sector but there is such a demand that a MEIFR CPL, a pulse, and 500 hrs will force you to choose among multiple employment offers on Q400's and Regional jets.

It is only in the US that the ATPL requirements for virtually all airline jobs forces new pilots to make their bones in the real world before they get on with an airline. I think this process serves to weed out most of the unmotivated and the poseurs with the ones left being the the guys and gals who truly have the flying bug. I don't think it is coincidence that the US continues to leads the world in flight safety incident/accident metrics.

BafanGuy
 

Thanks
So , In 2002 CPL was average age 45,5 and ATPs 46,6 years.
In 2018 per 31 December FAA CPL active pilots was 46,3 so stable.
The ATPs on the other hand is average 51 years old, ie a massive retirement in progress!!!
Keep in mind that in 2009 there was 125 619 CPL and 144 600 ATP total 270 219 Fixed Wing pilots.
In 2018 there was only 262 015 total BUT 162 145 ATP and only 99 880 CPL, ergo the picture is worse then I suspected.

Need to digest this and would love to have the same in Europe.
( PS You can subtract a 54 year old ATP holder from that list, Yours truly.)
Just out of curiosity ,what is the contracted retirement age in the Majors and the Commuters, anyone?
Again BG : Thanks. The facts are out there, indeed!
Regards
Cpt B

While I agree in general with your thoughts, and could not put most of it better even if I tried, one thing came to mind:

If easyJet in EU could be the overseas equivalent of Southwest: best paying LoCo and the most thoughtful of working conditions (okay okay, one eyed leading...)
- why the staggering difference in landing incidents?

Especially as what you write is really true and the most expensive jet-direct programme rooted from an EZY TRE back in the days.

Exactly my point.

As far as I know, it's the regulatory max age at FAR Part 121 operations. Some carriers will have a provision for early retirement with the details varying I'd imagine.

When I retired under a defined-benefit plan with a monthly annuity payout, the penalty was 3% per year early. I left 4 years ahead of the regulatory max age and lost 12% of what the full payout would've been. Then they terminated the pension plan and it all became moot.

I have no idea what airlines are doing today with a defined-contribution retirement plan.

In either case, retirement is based on regulatory max age.

BG
Indeed, and in 2009 Congress decided 60 was to young and 65 was the magic number in FAA Land.
The reason I am asking is that it changed a bit earlier in Europe and KLM for example had 57 as the Contracted retirement age.
But as You say it is all in changing nowadays so my hobby statistics are , shall we say a bit up in the air!
But to conclude for today from what I can see from the FAA stats I can only conclude this.
1 January 2019 there is 162 145 ATPs . Most are Commanders with an average age of 51.
1 January 2019 there is 99 880 CPLs No Commanders with an average age of 46,6.
A grand total of 262 015 airline pilots.
Assuming quite a number of the FOs in the Majors and the Commuters are holding an ATP that means that the average Cpt is well over 51!

Indeed Boeing stated in 2016 that in 2026, 42% of ALL pilots flying for the Majors would have to retire for the 65 year limit.
A pilot crisis, potentially, ABSOLUTELY. Its in the numbers. Simple!
How to avoid?
Crank up the numbers!
On the Pay Check!
Simple!

Happy Days
Cpt B

I've read the Boeing and Airbus public stats that Asia will need some obscene number of pilots over the coming years.

I'm pretty sure Boeing and Airbus just pull those numbers out their ass.

There are thousands of US pilots commuting to work in foreign lands. I was one of them and one time. I know most or all of them would be quick to take a job in the US if the pay was right.