Excrab,
No need to apologise for the rant. I was not in any way having a go at ppl instructors of the past/present, just making the point that it might have an effect on CPLs wanting to make a living as instructors in the future. If there are a large number of experienced PPLs willing to instruct at a certain club, pure economics mean that rates of pay will be driven down. In reality however, there may be relatively few PPLs willing to fund an FIC course or have the time to do it.
I wasn't implying that instructing pay would ever compete with airlines - of course it wouldn't. But if it was a more sensible wage it may encourage more into F/T instructing and keep up the flow into CPL/IR instruction.