That's not... rich, not in 2025. That's comfortable in most major American cities, but not rich. And then you have to take into account the fact that these pilots are away from home quite often, and have dozens, if not hundreds, of lives in their hands when they do their jobs, and that makes me think they're fairly compensated for doing the actual labor that the company needs to operate. Meanwhile, the CEOs make more in a year than most Americans will make in an entire lifetime [1]. And that's not even getting into some of the dividends that airlines pay people who just happen to possess a piece of paper.

[0]https://simpleflying.com/salary-us-pilot-2025/ [1]https://onemileatatime.com/insights/highest-paid-airline-ceo...

I agree that's not exactly rich, but that's a damn sight more than "comfortable". That's really good money. I'm not even saying that's the problem with air travel like GP claimed, but let's not pretend that $160k isn't a great salary. That's more than I make as a principal systems engineer in the tech industry!

No offense to you or any other engineers, but I actually think the pilot who is responsible for hundreds of lives per flight should make more than us software folks.

I work in tech but it seems like to be a high earning pilot you just need to:

- practice flying for 1,500+ hours. That can take years unless doing it full time.

- pay 50k+ for pilot training.

- fly undesirable routes at weird times and to weird locations for 10+ years, until you “make the big bucks”.

- be away from home for approximately half the year.

- be on your “A game” daily otherwise you risk killing yourself and hundreds of passengers on your plane.

and more.

Wishing you luck on your journey, god speed complainer!

/s :)

In all seriousness I can personally think of much easier ways to earn $200k+. I don’t think pilots are overpaid.