Birdlady is correct, at the end of the day training in SA will work out cheaper than in the USA, mainly due to the cost of living.
Weather – well wherever you go in the US you are going to find al sorts of weather, in SA one can go desert – i.e. no weather , coast – variable weather, highveld, haze winter, CB’s in summer – it’s your choice
Next preference for SA – training syllabus mainly identical to ours
Then:
RT – again similar in all respects to ours, god help us with the pathetic standard (or non-standard) US phraseology.
Ground subjects/school – same as ours
Language (apart from accent and local idiom) same as ours
With reference to IR work – loads of procedural approaches – same as ours
As for work permits etc – then the US is about the worst for this, so SA is no different – but on the plus side:
No special visas, no TSA etc – basically you can rock up and go in SA, unlike the US where if you don’t get TSA’d you are dead in the water before you start.
Finally all those I’ve converted from SA CPL/IR to JAA CPL/IR have far less problems in the tests than do the FAA trained people, it’s not all a difference in the standard of training as much as a difference in aviation culture.
BTW I’m not biased against the FAA system, I have all the FAA qualifications, it is just that the SA licensing and training is much more in line with our own.