but frankly that's what my PPL did, and my CPL just taught me to do it better.
Sure, but that just shows what a half-useless ripoff the PPL is, has been for more decades than anybody can remember, continues to be, and this sorry state is not questioned by anybody, and why?
Perhaps the fact that the vast majority of the punters stop flying within a year or two. In fact, IME, most stop flying the moment they get their PPL.
And not just the PPL. I am slightly more than haflway through the Bogus (JAA) IR now. Never seen so much utter bollox. The relevance to aviation is somewhere below 10%. Luckily I have 2.5 months to grind my way through the Met and A/L question banks but what value does this deliver? Zilch. It is just a huge ego trip for a load of oddball types who have never flown a plane, and the PPL theory is no different. The PPL system hangs in there only because most PPLs give up right away and most of the rest never go anywhere, and the ATPL system hangs in there because everybody is too skint and nobody wants to rock the boat.