re: American Airlines cuts service to 3 cities

quote:

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“regional pilot shortage.”

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So from my understanding this is a self-inflicted wound by the FAA

They changed the minimum number of flight hours for pilots who wanted to fly for airlines to 1500hrs. It takes a very long time and is super expensive to work your way to that total time.

That policy change did not account for the high number of boomer pilots retiring. meaning the FAA made it harder to backfill vacancies right at the peak of the boomer mandatory age of retirement (65)

Beginner commercial pilots do not earn a great wage, regional pilots used to not get paid well but the shortage has helped boost their salaries. Most new pilots are racked with debt from all of the trainings and flight hours they have to pay for.