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Irrelevant. Your argument is still that highly unreliable profit sharing is a basis for not contributing. But profit sharing has only been high enough to make your point remotely relevant for a few years of the past 20 years, and only at Delta, only after the most recent contract pay rates, only for captains, and only with record level profits. I looked it up, Delta only got 10.3% this year. So a captain making 600k (which is not all qualifying income anyways) is *still* not going to max the 401k. So what is your point? Ignore the profit sharing and you are at the simple math of the Compensation limit. Your point is dumb. I'm sorry, but there's no other way to characterize what you wrote.

Meat loaf tonight

I like how you use 300k as your example on which to base your math. Of course if you low ball it or use new hires, your math looks right. 300k is an 82 hour monthly average for a WB FO or 69 hour monthly average for a NB CA. 82 hours is hardly hustling or playing the games and 69 hours is coasting (not that there’s anything wrong with that!) But man, you do you and keep training those financially illiterate pilots.

The max age for ATC is 56 for a reason

Sorry, but this is the dumbest thing I've read today, and Biff has been posting (love ya, biff 🤣) So now you're argument is that profit sharing at 17%, ignoring that profit sharing is *wildly* unstable, is enough to rely on to max the 401k? I think Delta got 16% last time (which AA and United were not remotely close to), which is the highest in the industry. For an FO making 300k that's $8,160 more in the 401k, which still doesn't max it out. I may have missed the knock out, but you just handed me the TKO. Thanks. You were simply wrong. That's fine, but don't give anyone advice.

Except... Compensation in a Safe Harbor plan does not include bonuses, like profit sharing, which has been good for us post-COVID and pays the same 17% into your 401k. A healthy, pensionable profit sharing check can make up for the under 50 crowd, and even for the over 50 crowd if they're playing the game well. I'm not saying everyone can reach these levels, but it's certainly not unheard of and will be more common when co contributions go to 18%. BTW, nice attempted flex. You were so, so close to the knock out.

Today, May 3rd in perhaps one of the tone def actions taken by the Biden administration (and that is saying something), the U.S. Department of Education announced an investigation of Emory University over...."Anti-Muslim discrimination." Seriously, if you voted for this clown, punch yourself in the gonads, repeatedly. Weeks of campus protests calling for genocide and the destruction of Israel...this is the response.

Cobras!

I haven't redone it for the new contracts, but you would hit the 401K income cap before you would max out your 401k. If you don't contribute, it was literally impossible to hit the max. But this does nicely demonstrate just how financially weak a lot of the pilots are. I've had to correct many people on that misconception. Edit: I looked it up, and the annual compensation limit for 2024 is $345,000. At 17% that limits the company contribution to $58,650. Well below the $69,000 cap ($76,500 if over 50).

An average CA or a hustling FO at a major with ~16-19% company contributions doesn't have to contribute a dime to reach IRS maximums by Thanksgiving, so I think you'll find plenty that don't contribute from their paycheck to a 401k. The question would be how many are not socking way with IRAs, HSAs, 529s, brokerage, crypto, Cubans (the cigars, not the bipeds), or gunpowder and lead. I suspect that number is near 0.

FSU didn't fuck around either, I love living in the free state of Florida!

I hear you. There is a very pro 2A judge that keeps fighting back against the restrictions and it seems as though magazine round limits and ARs might be back on the table in the future. I remain cautiously optimistic.

jesus

I have always wanted to get the statistics on how many airline pilots make zero contributions, and just rely on what the company puts in. Seems crazy to me, but at this point I bet it's at it's at least half.

If you're talking about age 60 to 65, that isn't true. We only changed to 65 AFTER ICAO raised it to 65. They changed their age limit, circa 2006, based on data. Since you bring up the age increase, it's a good point to include. Those at the top knew about an upper the limit when they chose this career. They've already benefited from those leaving ahead of them AND they got 5 more years than they had planned. They also can continue to practice their craft, just not hauling the general public. I had to sit and listen to a senior WB FO lecture me about why I should support 67 because he "needs" it. Nothing to do with discrimination, he just said he was unable to save any money in his 401k because he "had to pay for college for 4 kids." My counter is you did not NEED to fully fund your kids college, you chose to do that. It's admirable, but a poor decision if you're choosing that over funding your own retirement. All he did was increase the likelihood that his kids will have to support him later in life. He could have funded part of college, while still saving...they'll make their own money. I told him I enlisted in the Guard to pay for college and offered contact information for my base recruiters. Others told me they didn't contribute to their 401k because they didn't think they should have to fund their own retirement. ...uhh wut?! If you don't think it's moral to have an age limit, then I can respect that. I disagree with it because we have all sorts of age limits for various reasons, of which most are value. But it's OK to disagree.

There are several different threads I could post this, but since this one has been quiet lately, here it goes: So the Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers, the main agency advising Biden on economic policy, doesn’t really understand how the government borrows its own money.

I was into some real "bad ass" bands like Poison and White Lion back then. Then Nirvana happened. Break Break, CCW in OC (CA) is an ass pain (worse than butt smuggling lol).

Hey now! It was the late 80s, and power ballads were all the rage! Would you believe Second Change was .38 Special's highest-charting song in the United States out of 25 singles released? It peaked at No.6 in May 1989 and spending 21 weeks on the chart!

Lol, I don't know what you think my core argument is, but I've said multiple times that multiple things can be true at once. I have no idea what your second paragraph is supposed to convey. You think Congress cares about safety? Now who's naive? I also never said something is right because it's always been that way. I said that groups can create norms and rules as long as they are consistently applied. You joining that system indicates a moral endorsement of the act. Otherwise you are participating in an immoral system for profit, which makes you immoral. Of course you can disagree with the system you are a part of, but there is a big difference between disagreeing with something and believing it to be immoral. You have made the claim that it is immoral: Again, your arguments border on hyperlibertarianism. The reason libertarians have never and will never have any real power in any real society is because absolute adherence to individual freedom falls apart immediately upon contact with reality. The same group of people that will complain about the government setting an age limitation will complain at the amount of money the government would be required to spend to do cognitive testing on every pilot of every age. I used to consider myself libertarian until I realized it is the political manifestation of backseat driving. This whole conversation reeks of it.

Where do you see they killed people? Fernandes Barbosa, of Deerfield Beach, was on felony probation for possession of methamphetamine and possession of marijuana. He was also facing two probation violations. Reed, of Riviera Beach, is an 8-time convicted felon, whose last conviction was on Nov. 30, 2016, for burglary of an unoccupied dwelling in Martin County. He was also facing charges of possession of a weapon by a convicted felon, and possession of ammunition by a convicted felon. Montes, of Wellington, is a four-time convicted felon. He was born in South Carolina and was last convicted on Jan. 19, 2017, of willful fleeing and eluding in Palm Beach County.

My final thoughts are, pursue when absolutely necessary for the safety of the public. Public safety overrides your desire to catch someone for speeding. I know this is a double edge sword in regards to policies of no chasing probably leads to more runners. I've seen plenty of straight idiots leading police on 5 county 110+ mph chases all for a simple traffic violation or minor warrant. The folks who do this aren't smart criminals, they'll be caught very shortly, don't put my family or loved ones in danger to keep up with them at very high speeds in residential areas or busy highways. If you're dead set on pursuing the runner, end it as quick as possible. Don't chase them for 1/2 hour at high speeeds only to finally PIT them at the end. More cops need training/permission to do so, otherwise, don't pursue unless aboslutely necesasry. I appreciate cops. Have a few good friends that are cops. You couldn't pay me enough money to do what they have to do day in day out. That said, they are human and have egos and there are a lot that shouldn't have a badge. They don't engage their brain and take everything in prior to pursuing like in the above video. Have seen a lot of departments that have 'don't chase unless' policies and they back off after getting the plate. Half hour later they are found wherever because they are stupid and get arrested.

I open carry a battle axe. Nobody even worries about what gun I'm keistering when they see that thing. Break Break, how can a band called .38 special make such a pussy song? That's over half my wardrobe!

Fair enough. I just think these are separate arguments. My point is that we're wringing our hands over this being a safety issue, when really it's about something else. Fine to make an argument that it's not fair for them to be parked at the top of the list for that long. Just make that argument. And regardless of the status quo being what it was, there is precedent for having recently changed it without having provided such data. Which I acknowledge. It just seemed to me like you were making two arguments and tossing in any justification you could come up with. You eventually threw one of them out when your core argument appeared. I understand there is the justification you have that is backed up by safety concerns - I don't think the data is there. I also understand there's your other separate argument that really amounts to "it's always been this way so I think it's fair." Those are separate. Congress doesn't give a shit if it's always been this way. Congress does give a shit about "safety" - which is why the substrata of this discussion is what it is and why any argument that's going to have legs must enlist "safety." All the other arguments are interesting but academic.

Put some guns and a few rockets for added deterrence.

I think you are intelligent enough to have the conversation you want to have, but you are simply too self-righteous to listen. In either case, until you are capable of holding two thoughts at the same time, I don't need to write another manifesto just repeating myself. There is a safety justification that is backed up by decades of cognitive research, as well as insurance actuarial tables as pointed out above. 65 might or might not be the correct number. There is also a concept of group-based norms and expectations, which can be equally or unequally applied. In this case, the forced retirement is equally applied, which plays a huge part in determining whether or not the group norm is moral. Finally there is the concept of averaging and thresholding, which again, insurance companies (and the government, and schools, and churches, and people in general) have been doing for centuries because it is simply not practical to test all of the variables that one might want to consider individually for every restriction. If you can't get to there, we just aren't going to get anywhere.