FNG said:
Hairyplane (I think it was Hairyplane) commented in a thread a while back that he had the good fortune to be taught to fly by ex WW2 free spirits.
T'was me, actually. I think most of what you say is true, and the reason is that most instructors these days are trainee airline pilots.
Probably the only thing that would change that would be to make it easier for 'fun flyers' (ie non-career pilots) to become instructors.
SSD