Answer - Helicopter Pilot Salary Survey  

Captains pay at a regional is less than captains pay at offshore or in the Northeast, even though the aircraft the helicopter pilot is flying has one third to one half the seats. 

Regional Airlines require the SiC to have 1,500 hours and an ATP, not a requirement for an S-76 SIC.  The S-76 SiC needs less time, gets paid more, and flys an aircraft with one quarter of the seats of a regional jet, not to mention works less.  

There are plenty of regional captains out there that are no spring chickens. They have been with regional airlines for 12-15 years all that time making less that a helicopter captain flying offshore in an aircraft with far fewer seats.   

What is simplistic is looking at a 20 year Boeing 777 captains pay and thinking that is what all airline pilots get paid.  Seniority will prevent most pilots at an airline pilots from ever reaching that level.