Originally Posted by
KRviator
No it's not.
Dick Smith is pretty spot on on what he's said, but it's a little more involved than that.
The data I've found only goes to December 2021, but it shows a gradual decline from 53-54% to 46% of all (eligible) US pilots hold an instrument rating. I
excluded glider and sport pilots from the total US pilot population but left
student pilots included. The %-age will be
slightly lower if you were to include glider & sport pilots, but I don't think that's fair. It's like including RAAus pilots in the pilot population here...
However, If you simply
exclude student pilots but leave everyone else there, you'll find about 2/3rds of all US pilots hold an instrument rating - but If you crunch the numbers a little more (table 9's the best view), and assume CPL/ATPL's
need a CIR for their employment, you find that it's 15% of PPL's that hold a rating as at December 2021
Its made a little harder because in the States a lot of people who only ever fly their own aircraft privately hold a Commercial license. It makes their insurance cheaper and is pretty easy to get if you are a private pilot flying 100 hours or so a year.