Not true geordiejet, there are still airlines out there who will either pay for your TR and bond you, or you pay the TR and they pay it back to you over a bond of 2/3 years. The typical operators who insist on you self funding your own TR are the likes of the low cast carriers and the bucket and spade charters.
I think half the problem is that most wannabee's come on here and dont realise that life actually exists beyond Easyjet, Ryanair, BMI and Thomas Cook.
They see a nice shiny FTO pic of some smiling numpty standing beside the big 'orange' airbus and dont realise there are actuall many other options open to them in the flying world.