U.S. Airline Employees Headcount (Full-time and Part-time Employees)

U.S. airline industry (passenger and cargo airlines combined) employment decreased to 784,310 workers in December 2022, 27 (0.003%) fewer workers than in November 2022 (784,337) and 34,820 (4.65%) more than in pre-pandemic December 2019 (749,490).

U.S. scheduled-service passenger airlines employed 499,171 workers in December or 64% of the industry-wide total. Passenger airlines added 261 employees in December for a twentieth consecutive month of job growth dating back to May 2021. Southwest Airlines led scheduled passenger carriers, adding 374 employees; United added 367; and Sky West added 275.

U.S. cargo airlines employed 280,376 workers in December, 36% of the industry total. Cargo carriers lost 266 employees in December. FedEx, the leading air cargo employer, decreased employment by 331 jobs.

U.S. Airline Full-Time Equivalents (FTEs)

BTS calculates FTEs by dividing the number of part-time employees by 2 and adding that figure to the number of full-time employees. The December industry-wide numbers include 673,324 full-time and 110,986 part-time workers for a total of 728,817 FTEs, an increase from November of 35 FTEs (0.005%). December’s total number of FTEs remains just 5.58% above pre-pandemic December 2019’s 690,313 FTEs.

The 26 U.S. scheduled passenger airlines reporting data for December 2022 employed 473,349 FTEs, 488 FTEs (0.10%) more than in November 2022. December’s total number of scheduled passenger airline FTEs is 19,686 FTEs (4.34%) above pre-pandemic December 2019. Data by passenger carrier category can be found in the accompanying tables.

U.S. cargo airlines employed 250,819 FTEs in December, down 434 FTEs (0.17%) from November. U.S. cargo airlines have increased FTEs by 18,466 (7.95%) since pre-pandemic December 2019.

Reporting Notes

Data are compiled from monthly reports filed with BTS by commercial air carriers as of February 3, 2023.

Passenger, cargo, and charter airlines that operate at least one aircraft that has more than 60 seats or the capacity to carry a payload of passengers, cargo, and fuel weighing more than 18,000 pounds must report monthly employment statistics. Regulations require U.S. airlines to report employment numbers for employees who worked or received pay for any part of the pay period(s) ending nearest the 15th day of the month.

See the tables that accompany this release on the BTS website for detailed data since 2015 (Tables 1-15) and industry summary monthly data since 1990. Additional individual airline numbers are available on the BTS airline employment web page. The web page provides full-time and part-time employment numbers by carrier by month from 1990 through December 2022.

Missing carriers: 2HQ (Elite), AMQ (Ameristar), and WL (World Atlantic dba Caribbean Sun).

ExpressJet (EV) is in Chapter 11 and discontinued operations on August 22nd, 2022. EV filed a P-1(a) report on 9/28/22 for August activity. There are no operations to report for September 2022 and beyond.

The next update for U.S. airline employment is scheduled for March 7, 2023.