wannabe aviator
You can pay for a rating - but this is expensive and does not always lead to a job! By expensive, it costs ( bit of a stab in the dark here, someone else may know) about £25k for a course, then you have to find a job who will take you on with (limited) experience. It changes, when there is a relative shortage of pilots airlines will take low houred pilots on and pay for the type rating. Like what happened to me with my first airline job in 1998. Things have changed since then, as airlines have realised that people are prepared to pay for the CPL and are prepared to pay for the "type rating" as well. Now, if the source dries up and there are fewer people around getting the full finance together for all the training and people cannot afford "type ratings" anymore then maybe the airlines will pay for it again (maybe through a reduced salary etc)
Hope this Helps