Focus: United Airlines grapples with pilots avoiding the captain's chair
Focus: United Airlines grapples with pilots avoiding the captain's chair
Many pilots are turning down the captain's job as they do not want the unpredictable schedule that comes with the bigger paycheck.
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As a pilot the problem with upgrading early is seniority dictates QOL. A junior captain needs to work a junior base, fly a junior plane, and get whatever crappy trips are left in the schedule. That means that a senior First Officer would have to move or commute to a new city until they build enough seniority to go back to where they want to live all while working the worst schedule, or even worse sitting on reserve. Absolutely not worth the pay bump when you can wait a little longer and not have to deal with all that.
Have you done the mental math about where the pay would make it worth your while?
Hard to say, upgrade means going to a junior base which are almost universally high COL areas and you'd need to either move there or rent a crash pad for several months to several years until you can go back.
In my case, I'm lucky enough to have 0 ex-wives and no kids to put through college so I'm in a comfortable position money wise. It would take a pretty big chunk of money for me to take the hastle to upgrade until I could hold my base.