As an aside, the linked article was published in June 2011 and there are already more RPA pilots than F-16 pilots in the USA
There's an interesting article in the most recent Janes Defence Weekly about this very topic. Whilst the numbers might look rosy, there appears to be a growing discontent amongst the RPA crews that there is a degree of apartheid between the RPA crews and the traditional rated pilots (seemingly around the question of medallic recognition leading to a sense of being 'second XI' pilots).
Also, questions are starting to be asked about how long an RPA would survive in contested airspace where an opponent has an IADS. Predator et al have been fantastically successful in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere, but all of these theatres have been essentially permissive air environments (for FW operating at higher level, certainly not for RW).
All in all, the next few years should be an interesting time for RPAs. I can see a massive role for them e.g MPA and other ISR related tasks in benign airspace, but they are hardly a low cost option to be thrown away like the Army's Phoenix UAVs were a few years back. It's going to take some careful thought and will probably depend on a few RPA operators / customers making it to a high enough rank to guarantee some influence in the decision making process though.