PPT,
I've been a long time member, just decided to change my name yesterday. Now, whilst old boy pilots might say the quality of life is declining, what you must still draw in to the picture is that the quality of living is still leaps and bounds ahead of 98% of other careers. Albeit people maybe unhappy about comprimises having to be made, but you must take it in context of the bigger picture.
And in my opinion, there has been a lot of doom mongering going on, I've noticed mainly by people who seem to be recurringly knocked back. Unlucky for them, but the kind of people who will get pilot jobs would not deter people from joining their beloved career simply because of their own bad luck - it simply would not be in their character.
Admittedly the "not what you know, but who you know" is very true, but if you look hard enough and work hard enough the links are their to be made. People I know have slogged through night shifts working for airliners in seemingly menial jobs, but they met the right people and within a year, these people were all on their way. Mostly for the airlines they slogged for. So you can't whinge about it being a who you know situation, its a question of how much you're prepared to do to get to know them.