I am going to get flamed, but... This is perhaps one of the only industries that depends on your own or your parents bank balance, rather than skill.
Well of course you need money to get through the training - regardless of which way you go about getting the training.
You see, the "skill" element you're talking about here shouldn't just refer to the skill required to fly a plane. It should be extended to include the skill required in thinking ahead about your future aspirations - what you want to do and how you're going to do it. That's the skill. As you say, people like yourself get too many years down the line and can't past a PPL - wishing they'd only had the foresight to do it all a bit earlier (or had the finances earlier).
Too many people on this forum have a long and lengthy habit of shooting down those who've stumped up the cash to get into flight training.
I had to find the cash from somewhere - but my parents didn't have tens of thousands available for me to help myself to. But I also started out on this journey when I was 14 years old. I had to plan my education - whether I was going to go to university or not - thinking ahead - knowing the cost of flight training - weighted up against the cost of university.
I had to get a job after I left school - earn the cash - save it all up. Then ten years later I was able to afford to learn to fly.
Back to the original point - airlines are always going to find ways of cutting costs - paying to fly is just a natural extension of the already-in-existence system of joining an airline on a reduced salary or with a bond. It'll continue to develop and expand as long as it makes the airline money.
..but those who've been in the industry a long while and keep piping up that it's the "new" generation of qualified pilots that are reducing pilot salaries and diluting the industry are living in cloud-cuckoo-land. What do you expect new pilots to do exactly? Insist on NOT paying for their TR? I tried that - but even when I joined my airline, clearly it was evident that I was paying for my TR - albeit over a number of years with a reduced salary / bond. It's the world we live in - it's the nature of the industry - and rather than blame newly qualified pilots about dumbing down T'c & C's - take a long hard look at yourselves.
Try asking yourselves - how did we let it get to this stage...?