I met a chap recently who had just finished all his training.
Great young bloke, somebody who I think has great potential.
Good cockpit management in the Sim, not a bad pair of hands, and a good attitude.
He had never stalled, and never spun, and from now on will never really fly again since he just got a job flying for Ryanair rather than working his way up through the fun stuff.
His piloting, rather than cockpit management skills are only going one way from here no-matter how much other good wisdom he accretes.
Sad really, because he will probably never enjoy flying as much as he would have in times past.
The simple fact is that there are some areas of aviation that have far better terms and conditions than in days of old, and funny old thing, they are the areas that are actually tricky and require skills and training.
Offshore work, SAR and waterbombing are examples.
They involve real flying skill rather than 200hrs and a certificate and thus are more immune to the plague of kids with rich parents/stupid bank managers.