Firstly, Globalstream, I have instructed my lawyers to issue proceeding against you for unlawfully posting my portrait photograph online. I use that particular pic for job applications and fear you may have dented my chances by distributing it willy-nilly.
V_2
1. Absolutely. Only a rich person, or person living in a caravan eating baked beans for every meal, can afford sufficient regular GA flying to build hours.
2. I agree with this. Considering the growth of commercial aviation at the airline level and the death of aviation at the local level, the very few opportunities to gain experience on air taxis etc are almost insignificant compared with needs of the airlines.
3. Instructing is worthwhile and good instructors make good pilots, but I know of many instructors who are in dead end jobs. Sitting in the right seat of a Cessna gaining hours as PiC despite rarely touching the controls does not make you a good pilot, but more importantly it does not make you attractive to employers. It might have done fifteen to twenty years ago, but now? Empirical evidence suggests no.
5. Those within the industry at the higher levels were not faced with the options that greet the new joiners. If there was a genuine option of self improving by going the light aircraft route I suspect many would take it. The reality is that there is not.