It created some pilots who drifted into the job, had no appreciation of how difficult it is for most to get there and no sympathy at all for those who didn't quite or who ended up in 'lesser' flying jobs.
Well said WWW, I also agree with your other comments.
South coast
You make a fair point and in a perfect world everyone would work his or her way up the ladder. However the majority of GA flying doesn’t pay enough to cover most peoples training debts so its ether the airlines or unrelated work with perhaps a little bit of instructing part time. Also I think it’s a good thing to take someone who has no real preconceptions and mold them to your airlines SOP's and gain their experience from said airlines training department. JAA/EASA are looking into a co-pilots licence for probably this reason and I would say it might have the knock on effect of increasing pay scales for GA pilots (dont hold your breath though!).
2WINGS
