| A couple things to consider: * Hour restrictions for passenger transport are significantly more stringent than for freight. * Southern Air's fleet consists 737s and 777s -- not small planes. * These plans have to fly over and into major metropolitan areas. * Many parts of flying can be automated, but in the end, and for aircraft this size, you probably want a human operator in the plane for the sheer reason that they are better equipped to handle unplanned emergencies. It's a tough call whether flying freight or regional airlines pays worse -- but in either case, you're anywhere from a quarter to half of what a software engineer of similar years experience in the bay area would make. The hours are in a lot of ways worse -- mostly because you're away from home a lot of the time, and you have really limited control of your schedule. (As someone who's worked as an on-call engineer for ten years, and who also flies, I'd take the on-call responsibilities over flying freight any day of the week.) I'd agree that the article lacks for details. But, a relatively quick reading through things like airliners.net will give you an idea of the kind of hours and pay these guys typically work -- it's not an easy job. If we care about their safety -- and our own, given the number of freight aircraft flying over us every night -- we shouldn't write them off as just asking for money they don't deserve. |
If we care about safety, we prohibit them from doing things that are unsafe. If management tries to make them do things that are prohibited, we should make it easy for people to say no without repercussions.