I wouldn't say that no-one (virtually as you say) is recruiting. In the past 4 months I have heard of at least 3 people getting airline work
Which rather illustrates the scale of your challenge. When I got my job 18 months ago, my airline was recruiting 10-12 low hours FOs
every month. Partly that was due to expansion, but a bigger reason was that the likes of BA, EZ, Netjets and the various charter airlines were all recruiting experienced FOs, and people were moving on. Not to mention FR hoovering up loads of 200hr CPLs. Then came the recession, and the market ground to a halt. Other airlines stopped recruiting, and as a result, so did we. We have not recruited any FOs for over 9 months, and have a well-stocked holding pool. In the meantime, schools are still churning out CPLs and the list of unemployed low-houred pilots is growing ever longer. The consequences are obvious.
You asked whether a SSTR was worth it at the moment, and you also say you want to get the correct facts. The fact is that the job market is on its knees, and the occasional success story excepted (most likely a temporary seasonal contract in any case) there are virtually no jobs out there - because virtually no-one is recruiting. In my opinion, this is an extremely bad time to be spending money on any sort of commercial flying training (not least an SSTR). That's my view as a UK based airline pilot, based on my experience within the industry, and that of my friends and colleagues, but feel free to disregard.