The Professional Aviation Safety Specialists (PASS) union is reporting that “hundreds” of FAA employees have been fired in the wake of action from the newly formed Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). The list includes primarily probationary workers who have been in their positions for less than a year. The union claims that is because probationary employees are less protected than their more experienced colleagues.
Disgusting! What follows is perhaps a rationalization of what has just occurred. Either there is an informed and an effective alternate or the descent into a chaotic future will unfold. How in he%# did this occurr?
Hopefully the lay offs will include some of the lazy FAA maintainence inspectors who sit on their fannys all day. In refuse to put their signature on any fields approvals for one time STC’s.
You fail to mention that no controllers were let go or any other essential workers. You had to go to the BBC for the comment you wanted? Please give the full story in the future.
You’re correct. The story also failed to also mention these firings are ILLEGAL and do nothing to enhance safety or reduce waste, fraud, and abuse.
The LEGAL way to accomplish what the administration wants would be do conduct a Reduction In Force, follow OPM regulations, and target jobs they believe are a waste of money. INSTEAD they are just cutting everything they can with no thought on how to actually make the system better. This leads to chaos and less safety. The article, if it it was giving the full story, would point out just how STUPID this all is
When Trump and Musk finish with the FAA there will be even fewer government employees AND a better updated system will be in place. It’s going to be awesome.
Since it was apparently an indescriminant firing of “probationary” employees (which includes senior employees who recently switched positions), it would only be by pure luck that such lazy inspectors were included.
This move is entirely theater and does nothing to cut out actual waste, but it does make qualified and productive employees reconsider their current job and start looking elsewhere. So these moves could make it more likely only mediocre employees will be left. This happens quite often when private equity firms buy up businesses and make similar moves.
Point is that it’s normal for any large employer to lose 1/2 of 1% of employees in any given quarter. Point is that a few hundred low end employees out of 45,000 experienced employees is even less noticed.
The informed person sees that this is a press release from a UNION and the union is more concerned with loss of future union membership/dues.
Excellent news - We’re $38 trillion in debt and the government is bloated with non-performing employees. We’ve had 5 rounds of layoffs were I work in OEM automobile manufacturing over the last 15 years. Each time, there are cries of outrage that certain jobs will never get done…3 months later it’s a non issue. Kudo’s to Musk and Trump for doing the long overdue thinning down of government.
Except this doesn’t target non- or low-performing employees at all. It just indiscriminately targets employees who have been in their current position for less than a year, which could very well include some high-performing employees. It’s not even targeting employees by their salaries.
Also, if we want to get rid of non-performing government employees…we really should be “firing” most of Congress. Remember that it was Congress that abdicated their power to all of these government agencies that everyone loves to complain about.
Seems some of you don’t get out much. My home airport has experienced staffing issues for over a year now and flying a jet or IFR is now more challenging when everyone is doing their own thing. Do I need the FAA when I’m flying around VFR in my 182…no. But it’s a concern when one person is handling clearance, ground and tower. How is this safe?
Your statement is so off the mark and blatantly anti-union that I could not help but chuckle a little. “Even a blind man can hit the dart board a few times.” A responsible company does not indiscriminately let all employees of a certain experience level go, across the board, without the due diligence of understanding what pipeline those employees are moving through. It would then be impossible to attract and retain good talent. Probationary employees in the federal government are not “low end.” Probationary employees are categorized by time on the job, not level of pay or responsibility or technical expertise. Probationary employees in the FAA can be anything from a new low level secretary/assistant to a college graduate with a technical degree in aerospace engineering, looking to enjoy a career serving the country in an aviation safety related field or working with the professionals who maintain and/or upgrade the equipment used by pilots of ALL TYPES to safely get from point A to B. These things don’t take care of themselves, nor do they just maintain their status quo. Upgrades to software are constantly being developed and installed throughout the system. Probationary employees are in the pipeline to replace those expected to retire in the near future. You also fail to understand that PASS is just a small part of the bigger picture, and they only represent a small part of the group of dedicated employees who keep systems up and running. Your systems you take for granted, such as communication and computer systems, navigational aids, flight standards, manufacturing inspectors, mission support, flight inspection and flight check pilots, engineering systems, airman certification, are all part of the group that PASS represents. PASS is not concerned with money/dues as you say. Any union is concerned with ensuring its members are treated fairly and justly, but also properly compensated for their dedicated service and the amount of responsibility they are willing to undertake. As for your large employer statistics, losing a small percentage of employees in “any given quarter” has nothing to do with indiscriminate laying off employees. A normal attrition rate is actually around 10% in any given period, and those are voluntary through retirements, employees moving on to other interests, changes in family situation, etc. Layoffs or across the board firings are in addition to that. Bear in mind that all federal government workers are not required to be dues paying members, it is not a “union shop,” but the unions, and there are many, do represent all who are part of the BU.
" A responsible company does not indiscriminately let all employees of a certain experience level go, across the board, without the due diligence of understanding what pipeline those employees are moving through."
LOL.
You’ve never been through a modern layoff cycle at a very large industry.
Yes, seriously. Getting a government job isn’t an easy process, and once you have it you intend to keep it. Feed your family. Pay for your house. You aren’t some motherfreakin’ number to be swept aside for no reason. By no reason I mean during the probation period you CAN be fired for any reason, most likely “performance,” whether or NOT you are performing as expected. They are getting cut because that’s the easiest way to cut the NUMBERS. So put yourself in their shoes, AJ. Its not about a freakin percentrage, It is about the people.
Are you the guy who has to rebuild his life because of this nonsense? Are you the guy who has to go home and tell his family he was fired? ARE YOU THE GUY WHO HAS TO LOOK HIM IN THE EYE?
The fact is the FAA needs an overhaul and hire folks from industry versus the folks that worked in the tool crib or have no other aviation experience. All of their hiring should be external and not continue promoting incompetence. I personally know many people that work in the FAA that are very competent but they are in the minority.