Fewer & fewer pilots are coming up thru the ranks that can't actually manage an A/C unless they have help by way of an Auto Flight System!
How right you are. I recall a simulator session in a 737 where a F/O with 250 hours from north of the equator (sorry but political correctness guru's scan these pages) was practicing for his IPC. For the sake of the exercise he was told to turn off the flight director for the take off. He refused, saying he had never flown without a FD. During the take off run the PM called "80 knots" but omitted to call V1 and VR for some reason.
The PF kept going until right at the end of the runway with the 737 at V2 plus 30 knots and still on the runway, the PF turned to the PM and said accusingly "You forgot to call V1 and VR." By then the aircraft would have gone through the localiser aerials beyond the end of the runway. This, and numerous other items gave grave cause to doubt his ability to fly an aeroplane; let alone undertake an IPC.
Yet his licence showed he had a command instrument rating on a Seminole issued at an Australian flying school 12 months earlier. In the meantime he had been issued with a 737 type rating at an approved FAA facility in the USA..