Air Traffic Controllers Set to Receive 2.8 Percent Raise

America’s certified air traffic controllers are set to receive a 2.8 percent pay increase in October, on top of raises issued earlier this year.

This raise kicks in on Oct. 18 and is retroactive to the beginning of the year, meaning that more than 11,000 federal workers will receive lump-sum payments in the low-to-mid thousands of dollars and have more take-home pay going forward.

“Securing this pay increase took persistent advocacy on behalf of our members, both on Capitol Hill and at the negotiating table,” Nick Daniels, president of the National Air Traffic Controllers Association, announced days before the raise was set to take effect.

On the opposite side of the negotiating table was Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy. Like Daniels, Duffy also celebrated the deal as a win.

“President Trump has made clear that we must modernize our skies and deliver results for the flying public,” Duffy said.

“That means taking a hard look at how we operate, fixing outdated staffing practices, and growing our air traffic control workforce.”

He said the changes were important for safety, for more strategic allocation of controllers, and for better airspace utilization.

The major areas for improvement from the Transportation Department’s perspective are better timecard tracking, allocating controllers to better meet demand, and a reassignment process more consistent with those demands.

Controllers will have to badge in and out, as most federal workers do, making their efforts easier to track. Managers at airports will work with unions to better schedule for demand. The way transfers are handled will be overhauled and will prioritize moving controllers to where they are most needed.

Congress budgeted the money in the hope of attracting more controllers and retaining those currently employed. “As air traffic has increased, the air traffic controller workforce has shrunk,” was the bottom line of a 2025 Government Accountability Office study.

During government shutdowns in particular, controllers are more likely to call in sick, resulting in many canceled flights, according to the study.

Median pay for air traffic controllers in 2025 was $148,080, or $71.19 per hour, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

This deal for the controllers is better than what typical federal employees received for 2026. Most federal workers outside of law enforcement and the military got a 1 percent raise. The certified controllers received that raise early in the year, and now they’re getting an additional 2.8 percent bump.

More fully trained certified controllers are needed, the federal government believes. It is trying to hire an additional 3,000 of them.

The Federal Aviation Administration has offered various financial incentives to support recruitment. It is also looking at ways to shorten the lengthy training and certification process. The whole process can stretch from two to six years and can burn out many candidates.

A report for the Brookings Institution by policy scholar Dorothy Robyn said that most of these initiatives were on the right track, but maintaining adequate funding from Congress could be a problem.

Separately, Congress allocated more than $12 billion in 2025 for needed equipment improvements, and may have to allocate additional billions in the next few years. Funding for that expense could compete with funds to add more air traffic controllers.

Gary Leff, owner of the popular View from the Wing travel website, said that with the latest pay hike, the Federal Aviation Administration used the leeway granted to it by Congress to force some overall “modest improvements” in the current system, including one particularly important safety improvement.

“The agency is getting rid of controllers leaving before their paid shift ends,” he told The Epoch Times. “This is a big deal after two LaGuardia controllers had departed early before March’s fatal aircraft-firetruck collision.”

Overall, he thinks government funding is one of the problems holding back American air traffic control.

“Annual congressional appropriations are just a poor way to handle long-term capital needs,” of the system that manages air traffic to and from America’s airports, he said.

Many nations, including Canada, have a government regulator that oversees air navigation service providers contracted by airports.

“Then the system’s needs are funded by user fees, rather than taxpayers,” Leff said.