Air Traffic Controllers May See Pay Raises As Trump Admin. Seeks To Boost Enrollment

The Trump administration is taking serious steps to boost recruitment numbers for air traffic controllers, including a 30% pay hike.

Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy made the announcement during a press conference at the air traffic controller’s academy in Oklahoma on Thursday. He argued that the pay structure and the technology air traffic controllers are forced to use are outdated.

“Currently, students are paid $17.61 an hour. By the way, you might be able to go to Walgreens and make that, right? So we’re going to bump it up to $22.84 an hour,” Duffy said. 

“And again, I think making sure people have a wage that can allow them to live while they’re going through school. But the real incentive is, again, three years out of this academy, and you’re certified, on average, $160,000 a year. So you can be 24 years old, 23 years old, making a great salary, as an air traffic controller.”

Duffy noted that the pay increase plan will require Congress to approve “billions” in additional funding for the DOT.

Elon Musk also sent out a request for retired air traffic controllers to return to work.

The announcement comes after a string of air travel disasters in recent weeks, though few of them were blamed on air traffic control.

In late January, an Army Black Hawk helicopter and an American Airlines passenger jet collided over the Potomac River, killing all 67 people on board.

A Delta Air Lines flight from Minneapolis to Toronto‘s Pearson International Airport experienced a severe incident upon landing last Monday. The aircraft overturned on the runway, resulting in injuries to eight individuals, one critically.

Most recently, a Southwest airliner narrowly avoided a collision with a Flexjet business jet on a runway in Chicago. The Southwest plane was coming in for landing as the Flexjet, allegedly ignoring instructions from air traffic control, crossed the landing strip.

Pilots in the Southwest plane were able to take off again quickly enough to avoid a collision.