Quote: “
. Think of all those integrated or sponsored people. Out of school straight into an airline.
This represents alot of airline personnel.”
Only in a few small aviation countries, mainly in Europe. In the two biggest countries in world aviation, the USA and Canada, which together represent well over 40% of world aviation, most pilots work their way up the food chain. The same applies in the fourth largest country, Australia, and to a good extent in Africa.
On the way up these pilots acquire a valuable thing called experience! Their experience makes them much more valuable and safer when the chips are down. You can only learn so much from books or computers. Such pilots with genuine experience also collect a good fund of tall tales for wasting time over a beer or two or three, which makes them better company compared with an academic and computer (Airbus) pilot who has never had a real flying job.