To qualify for the credit, a taxpayer must earn money, but not too much. 1  $46,997 ($52,427 if married filing jointly) in households with three or more qualifying children. 2  $43,756 ($49,186 if you're married and file jointly) with two qualifying children.
This group excludes regional, national and international airline pilots. Commercial pilots earned a mean annual wage of $76,050 a year as of May 2011. The median reported salary was $70,000 per year, and the median-earning 50 percent of commercial pilots earned between $50,850 and $92,340 a year.
The average airline pilot received an annual salary of $119,180 as of May 2011, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. The BLS category for airline pilots is scheduled air transportation, which included 58,630 pilots, or 86 percent of the 68,350 total number of pilots.