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The sad thing about GA is that it’s just so cost prohibitive. You’re talking tens of thousands of dollars just to get the basic license, and even then it’s not

The sad thing about GA is that it’s just so cost prohibitive. You’re talking tens of thousands of dollars just to get the basic license, and even then it’s not that practically useful (you can’t even fly at night or in weather without an instrument rating). I would love to get my PP, but even in a well-paying field it’s just inaccessible without dedicating a lot more than I’m ready to give.

akiselev 4y ago
The GA manufacturing industry seems to have entered death spiral. With the fall in popularity of GA, the number of planes made every year went way down which drove the price of both new and used planes up. We went from producing almost 20,000 GA planes a year in the 1970s to under a thousand a year in the 1990s and it's barely recovered since then (1,500 a year IIRC)
- IAmNotACellist 4y ago
  Let me guess, the nadir happened in 1971?
GekkePrutser 4y ago
You can get the JAR-PPL SEP license for 10k exactly here in Europe (Spain -prepaid course) and everyone tells me that the US is cheaper. It's expensive yes but not out of reach of most people. Once you start looking into CPL, night rating, multiple engine etc that's when it gets expensive.
bobsomers 4y ago
> you can’t even fly at night or in weather without an instrument rating Minor nit: You can fly at night with a Private Pilot's certificate, but it must be under VFR like all your daytime flying.
- blueslurpee 4y ago
  This differs in Europe, where some NAA's view night flying as equivalent to IFR.
  - bombcar 4y ago
    Europe is weird about private license; so much so that a vast majority of people in Europe instead travel to the US for a few months to learn flying. Night flying over LA is great; night flight over the desert or the Midwest away from cities can be effectively IFR; VFR private licenses require some IFR time but I highly recommend spending some time on instruments if you’re going to VFR at night. And VFR over the top at night I just don’t recommend unless you have an IFR rating.

akiselev 4y ago

The GA manufacturing industry seems to have entered death spiral. With the fall in popularity of GA, the number of planes made every year went way down which drove the price of both new and used planes up. We went from producing almost 20,000 GA planes a year in the 1970s to under a thousand a year in the 1990s and it's barely recovered since then (1,500 a year IIRC)

IAmNotACellist 4y ago
Let me guess, the nadir happened in 1971?

GekkePrutser 4y ago

You can get the JAR-PPL SEP license for 10k exactly here in Europe (Spain -prepaid course) and everyone tells me that the US is cheaper. It's expensive yes but not out of reach of most people. Once you start looking into CPL, night rating, multiple engine etc that's when it gets expensive.

bobsomers 4y ago

> you can’t even fly at night or in weather without an instrument rating Minor nit: You can fly at night with a Private Pilot's certificate, but it must be under VFR like all your daytime flying.

blueslurpee 4y ago
This differs in Europe, where some NAA's view night flying as equivalent to IFR.
- bombcar 4y ago
  Europe is weird about private license; so much so that a vast majority of people in Europe instead travel to the US for a few months to learn flying. Night flying over LA is great; night flight over the desert or the Midwest away from cities can be effectively IFR; VFR private licenses require some IFR time but I highly recommend spending some time on instruments if you’re going to VFR at night. And VFR over the top at night I just don’t recommend unless you have an IFR rating.