The FAA just issued a new mandate requiring airlines to certify that pilot hiring is based solely on merit—not diversity initiatives—despite zero evidence of compromised safety. Is this regulation necessary, and even legal or just political signaling?
On Friday, the FAA announced new mandatory Operations Specification “Merit-Based Pilot Hiring” for all carriers operating under 14 CFR Part 121, which includes scheduled commercial airlines and it includes major cargo carriers as well.
The certificate holder shall ensure pilot hiring is exclusively merit-based to fulfill its duty to provide the highest possible degree of safety in the public interest.
Air travel remains remarkably safe, and safer than other forms of transportation. There’s no suggestion by DOT that any airline’s practices compromise safety in any way.
Here’s what the notice actually does:
- Directs FAA Principal Operations Inspectors (POIs) to notify each carrier of the Notice’s publication.
- Allow the carrier to submit written “information, views, and arguments” within 7 days of the notification letter.
- After considering any submission, send a disposition letter (adoption, partial adoption, or withdrawal).
- Issues the specification not later than 30 days after completing the previous step.
The Department of Transportation’s press release says “all U.S. carriers will be required to certify that [hiring based on race/sex] is terminated.” That isn’t quite correct. It is a requirement the airline accepts as part of its Operations Specifications.
Of course, most diversity efforts in pilot hiring has related to recruiting efforts and funding for training and that’s because of a shortage of pilots. Any business that wants to be more successful than average will need to do a better job finding talent, which means looking for talent where others aren’t.
And it’s a bit odd to suggest that pilot hiring has been too diversity-focused?
Was the #2 at the Denver hiring center also onboarded through DEI? Did she or did she not change fail grades for DEI hires because “it makes the numbers look bad”?
Did the instructor who failed this co-pilot ask corporate why they passed him?
— Ashley St. Clair (@stclairashley) January 5, 2024
You mean IOE right?
The repair. And a very costly one.
In fact a lot of the time, depending on age of aircraft(and other factors), it may just be totaled. Or repaired and sold. pic.twitter.com/4yzf03eNqd— MFAM Tesla (@JoshuaThePilot) January 5, 2024
The major pilot union was successful in lobbying for legislation that made it unnecessarily time-consuming and costly to become a pilot (e.g. the ‘1,500 hour rule’ which doesn’t apply in Europe, or to European airline pilots flying in the United States every day).
Without enough pilots, airlines went looking for potential recruits. But qualified pilots have not had difficulty in getting hired.
On the contrary, small cities have had difficulty retaining air service because pilot costs are too high to amortize across a very small number of seats. Airlines are phasing out 50-seat regional jets. There aren’t many 30-seat turboprops at regional carriers anymore!
A better approach to safety is broading to pool of available pilots, in order to make it possible to be more selective based on merit.
Now, I’m not sure it is legal to turn hiring policy into an aviation safety standard, turning 49 U.S.C. § 44701 into a general HR regulator. The notice does not make any evidentiary showing that unqualified pilots are being hired. Without data, findings, standard, or a measurable compliance test it’s not clear how this passes Administrative Procedures Act muster.
And while Ops Specs are case-specific approvals, this is a generally applicable mandate across all Part 121 carriers. I’m not even sure how the FAA audits this unless an airline makes announcements that directly claim to violate it. And an investigation is the only promised penalty in any case.
When United was ‘woke’ during the Biden administration (before donating to President Trump’s inaugural and defending his tariffs), they articulated a goal that at least half of new pilots trained would be women or people of color. Statements like that become dangerous under the rule, but they’re only dangerous under this DOT and United wouldn’t make them again until it’s beneficial to do to curry favor with a new administration.
Of course, the FAA itself for years engaged in diversity selection of air traffic controllers for limited spots at their academy, and this directly traded off with hiring ‘more qualified candidates’ but this is not in any way the cause of problems at the agency’s air traffic organization. And everyone that’s gotten into a tower has been properly certified to be there.
I fail to see the problem. No company should be basing their hiring standards on quotas with regard to sex, nationality, sexual orientation or whatever else. This isn’t the victim olympics here. People should always be considered for a position based on merit, education, training and experience. That’s just logical. When I fly, I could careless if the pilots are male or female, black or white, or who they sleep with. The only thing I care about is knowing that the pilots are well-qualified to fly that aircraft, that they have sufficient knowledge & training in emergency recovery and that they’re going to get us safely back on the ground so that I can get back home to my family. That’s it. This is no arena for social experimentation and certainly not a social proving ground.
Anyone who believes that a candidate less qualified for a position should be hired based on their skin color or any other attribute has lost their minds. This means hiring less qualified people and this is unacceptable for the airlines. All airlines should be hiring only the best and most qualified regardless of protected status so long as that hire is the very best of candidates.
I can comfortably say to the question: “were they ever compromising safety?” Without a doubt, yes. Somewhere, safety has been compromised. Where? I haven’t a clue. Maybe some guesses but not specifically. Had safety never been compromised somewhere, this wouldn’t be an issue at all.
I totally support DEI hiring if it means less MAGA on my plane.
I only wish the current Administration hired based on ability. It seems the only qualification for White House jobs is us the willingness to kiss up to the boss.
If we look at the American Airlines Flight 5342 crash, it wasn’t the pilots with more than 1500 hours of flight training time that made the mistakes.
TBH, only redneck white boys from Texas should be flying planes. Situation solved.
The pendulum swings, sometimes too far out of acceptable standards, as it did with affirmative action and the resulting reverse discrimination lawsuits of decades past. In any field, the ideal standard would be to choose the best qualified available at any given time. Any type of quota or carve-out that sidestep that, almost by definition will result in less qualified people in positions. Put everyone who meets standards in a hiring pool. Then pick the best out of that pool, regardless of gender, national origin, sexual preference of any other irrelevant characteristic. Anything less than that makes an employer a target for being put under the microscope and raising questions in the event of any type of safety related issue. Also, it is troublesome for those employees that fall into a certain demographic to be constantly defending themselves, their experience and professionalism vs. being a product of a hiring quota of some sort. Equal opportunity, not equal outcomes…
@Wileydog, well stated.
Even if there were no proven cases of unqualified pilots slipping through, that misses the point. Hiring decisions should be based solely on merit, skill, judgment, and psychological fitness, not immutable characteristics like race or sex. The moment those traits enter the equation, the process stops being purely competency based and starts drifting toward identity based preferences, which, at the very least, inevitably erodes confidence in the system. A merit only standard is not just fairer, it is the clearest and most defensible way to preserve both safety and public trust.
DEI, at its core, attempts to correct past discrimination by introducing new forms of discrimination, substituting group identity for individual evaluation. That doesn’t fix anything. When MLK said, “I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character,” I think he meant it quite literally. And I think far too many people, albeit with perfectly good and admirable intentions, have decided to ignore Dr. King’s wishes in favor of something that turns out to be a different brand of the same toxin. And ironically, every bit as evil. Good intentions all too often pave the road to hell.
When you have a decision-making body, like a corporate board, there is an argument for diversity since it may lead to different opinions being raised. I have seen this in my work in the Canadian federal government. But on a plane, there are (usually) only two pilots, maybe a few more for ultra long-haul. And it’s not really a place where opinions should be raised or even matter. Most decisions are routine, and to the extent they are not, I would not expect them to differ by race, gender, sexual orientation, etc. So the rationale for diversity doesn’t make sense for pilot hiring.
If you read the NTSB report on Atlas Air/Prime Air flight 3691 in February 2019 and or the NTSB report on United flight 702 in July 2023 then the answer is yes, these pilot were DEI hires.
You can pretend to intellectualize this topic, but pro-or-anti DEI is just culture war nonsense, mostly red meat for right-wing bigots who can’t stand non-whites and non-straight men in positions of authority.
The reality is that becoming a pilot is less about identity or any particular background, and more about economics. It costs a lot to put in the hours to become certified and maintain licenses. Without meaningful financial support (including the military background, because that’s how a lot get their training), it’s the poor, even if would-be talented pilots, who cannot enter this profession by lack of means.
No matter how many times it is said, the anti-DEI folk never seem to listen. But, I will say it again, DEI is NOT about hiring less qualified people, it is about getting the word out to all segments of society so that truly the best can be hired.
When I was hired into ZOB in 1974, I only knew about the openings because a good friend who was an ATC at CAK told me the FAA was hiring controllers.
@Retard (er, 1990) – I am openly gay and strongly oppose DEI.
Putting that aside, dismissing concerns about DEI as nothing more than “red meat for right-wing bigots” is not an argument, it is an attempt to shut down debate by assigning motive instead of engaging substance. Reasonable people can oppose the use of race or sex in hiring without harboring animus toward anyone. The core objection is not to “non-whites” or “non-straight men” in authority, it is to any system that treats immutable characteristics as relevant in professional selection. Reducing that position to prejudice lazily avoids grappling with the principled case for merit-based standards. But I would certainly expect nothing less from you.
On the other hand, you are absolutely right (shocker, I know) that economics is a major barrier to becoming a pilot. The cost of flight hours, ratings, and recurrent training is substantial, and military pathways have historically played an outsized role. But that reality actually undercuts identity-based hiring preferences; it strengthens the case for socioeconomic solutions. If the real bottleneck is financial access, then scholarships, low-interest financing, expanded ROTC style programs, airline-funded cadet pipelines, and broader training subsidies address the root problem without introducing race or sex as decision criteria. Targeting economic barriers directly is both fairer and more precise.