BTS 21-22

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

U.S. airline industry (passenger and cargo airlines combined) employment increased to 745,836 workers in March 2022, 6,546 (0.89%) more workers than in February 2022 (739,290) and 11,952 (1.63%) more than in pre-pandemic March 2019 (733,884).

U.S. scheduled-service passenger airlines employed 440,451 workers in March or 69% of the industry-wide total. Passenger airlines added 6,547 employees in March for an eleventh consecutive month of job growth dating back to May 2021. Delta Air Lines led scheduled passenger carriers, adding 1,481 employees; American Airlines added 1,254 employees, and United Airlines added 1,194. U.S. cargo airlines employed 277,245 workers in March, 37% of the industry total. Cargo carriers lost 6 employees in March. FedEx, the leading air cargo employer, decreased employment by 479 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 March industry-wide numbers include 637,431 full-time and 108,405 part-time workers for a total of 691,634 FTEs, an increase from February of 6403 FTEs (0.93%). March’s total number of FTEs is 2.5% above pre-pandemic March 2019’s 674,746 FTEs.

U.S. cargo airlines employed 247,517 FTEs in March, up 138 FTEs (0.07%) from February. U.S. cargo airlines have increased FTEs by 21,242 (9.4%) since pre-pandemic March 2019.

The 26 U.S. scheduled passenger airlines reporting data for March 2022 employed 440,451 FTEs, 6,547 FTEs (1.5%) more than in February 2022. March’s total number of scheduled passenger airline FTEs is 4,257 FTEs (0.96%) below pre-pandemic March 2019. Data by passenger carrier category can be found in the accompanying tables.

Reporting Notes

Data are compiled from monthly reports filed with BTS by commercial air carriers as of March 4, 2022. Additional airline employment data and previous releases can be found on the BTS website.

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 March 2022.