The Air Force has had a pilot shortage for at least 20 years now. They have a lot of challenges to producing & retaining enough pilots to meet their needs; high ops tempo, extended time away from family, pay that is significantly less than the airlines, side duties involving paperwork & email, etc.. They’ve tried to address it in various ways. Large retention bonuses are the primary means, but they’ve shortened training pipelines (for heavies anyway) & even introduced schemes to have civilian instructors rather than taking pilots off the line to go back as instructors. At some point, it’s running into issues with training aircraft availability & airspace limitations…even if you magically had the jets & instructors to fly them, the airspace is full. Former pilot training bases in Phoenix & Lubbock were closed. You could get the airspace in Lubbock back, but not Phoenix. The secret to pilot retention in the Air Force seems to be a terrible economy & struggling airlines. Otherwise, you have far too many leave the first chance they get (after about 11-12 years of service, there is a 10 year commitment that starts when you get your wings).

All absolutely correct. Besides the pay, the amount of additional duties piled on pilots is absolutely ridiculous. The airlines figured it out, pay pilots to be pilots, the military can’t seem to figure that out! Spending millions to train a military pilot and then pulling them out of the cockpit just as they are becoming experts in their aircraft is insane.

I mean, this will just accelerate the development of autonomous aircraft, and I’m probably not going to say this out loud in front of a room full of former Air Force personnel, but I think the future is an empty cockpit. Either way, it’s going to happen decades before passengers are flying on planes without two pilots. But if Ukraine has shown us anything, it’s that the future is cheap drone warfare, not multimillion-dollar fighter jets—sadly and terrifyingly. I mean, I remember a decade ago Amazon had a huge problem filling their warehouses with enough people to get packages out on time, and now I believe close to 80% of their warehouses are run by robots.

@MCCCANM Maybe a solution would be to add more Air National Guard positions (especially fighters)? I have heard that for many boards there are 100+ applicants per open seat.

Almost 20 years ago I sat in several meetings concerning this topic at our Majcom, and the sticking point was the unwillingness of the personnelists to craft a career path for pilots that didn’t force them out of the cockpit (surprise: pilots like to fly). They totally rejected the concept of warrant officers.

@MCCCANM Slots are still too hard to get. My son ROTC 97 on Pilot AFOQT did not get a slot due to grades. Dropped out and is in commercial pilot school now

@MCCCANM They just can't get it right - sometimes too many pilots, sometimes too few. Have a buddy that got both the stay in bonus and the get out bonus. For those of us that just wanted to fly, staff tours and school requirements are big deterrents, too.

@MCCCANM can't stop-loss solve all these problems? just refuse to let pilots (EVER!) leave.. you're in for LIFE! once people find out about stop-loss; they'll be lining up at the recruiting stations! (i wonder if i'm being sarcastic?)

How does this compare to commercial airlines? For years I keep hearing about pilot shortages. Is there a bigger underlying issue such as lack of interest in aviation? My biggest frustration with AOPA is they seem to have a bit of lack of awareness to training costs. Although they have upped their scholarships significantly.

@MCCCANM Friend's brother is in reserves right now, got called up for 60d active duty in February........ still there now. No end date known. Has wife/kids and commercial pilot career that awaits him. Bet he regrets staying in reserves for the pension now (he is near 20 yr).

@MCCCANM Its not even just the Manned folk’s, the RPA side has been getting poached for years by Border Patrol, 3 letters, and contractors. I can’t say for sure the current pipeline of getting RPA aviators their PPL/Instrument ratings are going to make it worse, but it certainly wont help

@MCCCANM What kind of desk work is there in the USAF? Is it really "far more" than at the airlines?

@MCCCANM My nephew who will be graduating Air Force ROTC in December just found out he got a pilot slot pretty cool

@MCCCANM I’m confused by your Phoenix point. All they (Luke AFB) did was move F-16 training to another base, and it’s now the #1 Lightning training base.

@MCCCANM I have the solution. Just buy Saab Gripens. Get rid of the F-35s.

@MCCCANM War on the Rocks has a ton of articles about it Including this one by Air Force specific related to promotions and the politics therein. Gen. Goldfein read it & the AF started to reform promotions. But it’s a mess. warontherocks.com/a-call-for-sen…

And you have to add in all the BS that comes with life in the military. By that I mean the constant training on social issues, the useless wastes of time due to other's stupidity, and a culture that treats personal time as something that is optional, its no wonder pilots prefer the airlines. Its starting to affect the maintenance AFSC's as well. The demand for maintainers in the civilian world is growing as fast. As the boomer retirement hits full speed, and the early gen-X's age out its only going to get worse.