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America desperately needs more air traffic controllers

cnn.com

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Re: America desperately needs more air traffic controllers

#291

Post by nradov »

pbalau wrote: post #180
ryandrake wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I would argue an ATC employee is worth every penny, but I also don't think there is a magical amount of money where you are going to suddenly double your pool of candidates willing to do this kind of work. These people are already very well compensated, and at a certain point you are just going to be cannibalizing other talent pools. It wouldn't happen overnight, but surely if ATC had a similar compensation reputat…

I think this is a naive way of looking at the problem. People that start working in banks, generally do that as a starting point. ATC is the end of the road for that career. Working in a bank is the start of a quite lucrative career, working as an ATC is the end. Indeed, we can offer more money to ATC, but there is not a lot, progression wise. Honestly, how would a junior ATC look like, compared with a senior?

ATC salary increases with experience. The better ones are promoted to supervisors.

Re: America desperately needs more air traffic controllers

#292

Post by appreciatorBus »

fiftyfifty wrote: post #183
legitster wrote: post #77

Everyone is going to make this about money or unions or etc, but my employer briefly worked with some ATC employee groups and I can tell you exactly why they are short staffed: - The FAA has strict hiring requirements. You have to be mentally and physically capable, and by their own admission less than 10% of applicants are qualified for the job. https://www.faa.gov/air-traffic-controller-qualifications - The trainin…

I've toured a couple of ATC towers recently and my impression was they were surprisingly low tech. A tech upgrade seems like the most viable solution at this point. There are processes for writing and testing software and hardware for environments such as this, but the government needs to be willing to make the investment.

* the voters need to be willing to not scream bloody murder if long term ATC investment raises taxes or airfares by $0.01

Re: America desperately needs more air traffic controllers

#293

Post by adamanonymous »

d0gsg0w00f wrote: post #254
tw04 wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everything you have listed above could be solved with money. Only 10% of applicants are physically and mentally qualified? Sounds like you need more applicants? Want to attract more applicants? Offer more compensation. The training and onboarding is incredibly long? Sounds like a doctor? Do you know why people go through the pain of becoming a doctor? Because they make a lot of money when they get through the other s…

> Do you know why people go through the pain of becoming a doctor? Because they make a lot of money when they get through the other side. I think the guaranteed respect and admiration that comes from the title is actually a more powerful draw. Don't get me wrong, the money is good, but on par with senior manager in any large tech firm. Doctor is a primal respect that technical roles do not carry. You're not getting i…

> You're not getting instant respect from mother in laws and pastors as an ATC

You would if it was known to pay $500k/yr+

Re: America desperately needs more air traffic controllers

#294

Post by janalsncm »

tw04 wrote: post #201
legitster wrote: post #77

Everyone is going to make this about money or unions or etc, but my employer briefly worked with some ATC employee groups and I can tell you exactly why they are short staffed: - The FAA has strict hiring requirements. You have to be mentally and physically capable, and by their own admission less than 10% of applicants are qualified for the job. https://www.faa.gov/air-traffic-controller-qualifications - The trainin…

Everything you have listed above could be solved with money. Only 10% of applicants are physically and mentally qualified? Sounds like you need more applicants? Want to attract more applicants? Offer more compensation. The training and onboarding is incredibly long? Sounds like a doctor? Do you know why people go through the pain of becoming a doctor? Because they make a lot of money when they get through the other s…

> Too much stress?

Not just that, but having a shortage means each ATC does more work which is inherently stressful.

Re: America desperately needs more air traffic controllers

#295

Post by nradov »

fiftyfifty wrote: post #183
legitster wrote: post #77

Everyone is going to make this about money or unions or etc, but my employer briefly worked with some ATC employee groups and I can tell you exactly why they are short staffed: - The FAA has strict hiring requirements. You have to be mentally and physically capable, and by their own admission less than 10% of applicants are qualified for the job. https://www.faa.gov/air-traffic-controller-qualifications - The trainin…

I've toured a couple of ATC towers recently and my impression was they were surprisingly low tech. A tech upgrade seems like the most viable solution at this point. There are processes for writing and testing software and hardware for environments such as this, but the government needs to be willing to make the investment.

The government is making that investment. Upgrading the legacy system will take decades regardless of how much money they spend.

https://www.faa.gov/nextgen

Re: America desperately needs more air traffic controllers

#296

Post by janalsncm »

legitster wrote: post #77

Everyone is going to make this about money or unions or etc, but my employer briefly worked with some ATC employee groups and I can tell you exactly why they are short staffed: - The FAA has strict hiring requirements. You have to be mentally and physically capable, and by their own admission less than 10% of applicants are qualified for the job. https://www.faa.gov/air-traffic-controller-qualifications - The trainin…

Assuming all you’ve said is true, why doesn’t every country have an ATC shortage?

> cannibalizing other talent pools

If we accidentally paid ATCs so much that it ate into the investment banking or high frequency trading talent pools I think we’d still be ok

Re: America desperately needs more air traffic controllers

#297

Post by taeric »

nradov wrote: post #289
jyounker wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The USA restricts the number of positions for medical schools and residencies. It's a problem that money could solve.

There is no restriction on medical school admissions. It's really just residencies.

My understanding is that this is a distinction that doesn't make a difference? Without a residency, can you become a doctor?

Re: America desperately needs more air traffic controllers

#298

Post by datavirtue »

FpUser wrote: post #285
d0gsg0w00f wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Do you know why people go through the pain of becoming a doctor? Because they make a lot of money when they get through the other side. I think the guaranteed respect and admiration that comes from the title is actually a more powerful draw. Don't get me wrong, the money is good, but on par with senior manager in any large tech firm. Doctor is a primal respect that technical roles do not carry. You're not getting i…

>"Doctor is a primal respect that technical roles do not carry." Used to be. Not anymore. Nowadays many doctors act as a smartass business people.

In my city it's an underpaid work-a-day job that half of them hate. There is something about being trapped that can make any job sick the life out of you.

I remember a former CEO who would come into work each day and let out a heavy sigh before unlocking his office door. I learned that he was trapped in the job until he retired for various reasons...most of his own making.

Re: America desperately needs more air traffic controllers

#299

Post by AnthonyMouse »

CrimsonCape wrote: post #284
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The general problem here is that we need to do something about the government contracting process. It has been thoroughly captured by large government contractors who do mediocre work for enormous sums of money while excluding anyone who could do better from the process through corruption and red tape. Which in turn means that important systems become frozen in time because upgrade attempts become boondoggles that ca…

You touch on an interesting idea. Imagine if there is a "USA ATC Github" open-source repo. As a consultant, you bid on maintenance of the repo and get repo ownership privilege in exchange for your contract. Now you are paid to contribute to the repo for the duration of the contract. The public gets to see if you are worth your fee. If your contract ends, ownership revoked and handed to the next consultant. The obviou…

> The obvious downside to this is that hardening code becomes a potential large amount of effort/overhead that could normally be concealed behind binaries and proprietary code.

This is not a downside, it's a benefit.

Suppose an adversarial country eventually gets access to the proprietary code. Do you want members of the public to have found and patched any obvious vulnerabilities before this point? Yes you do.

Re: America desperately needs more air traffic controllers

#300

Post by analog31 »

I realize it's not a complete or immediate solution, but I wonder how much buses and trains would help. I think about this, in a town with a regional airport, ~ 100 miles from a couple of "hub" airports. Flying to the hub is often slower than driving when all things are considered, and with the risk of delays. A bus or train could work a lot better if the locations of the stations were coordinated, and if there was a coordinated system for handling baggage. And, if the ticketing were consolidated. The bus is never delayed by weather.
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