...flying business jets is something I have never considered - have you taken this route yourself or do you intend to?
I have indeed taken this route myself. But 30 years ago... Started studying aerospace technology in 1980, did some gliding and hang gliding during the holidays as we have no "university air squadrons" here and everything else would have been too expensive.
After finishing univerity I got myself a part time job first and a ph.d grant later and spent all my money and spare time on flying lessons and hour building for several years. When I had my CPL/IR/ME/Instructor rating, I continued working freelance as engineer (mostly IT stuff for a big European aircraft manufacturer) and flew piston twins commercially for many years.
It was way too late then for the decent airlines as our flag carrier and its regional "daughters" used to have an age limit of 27 for ready entries. So I stayed in GA, finished my ATPL/MCC and finally moved to bizjets (with a short transition via turboprops in between).
I would do exactly the same thing again without hesitation
