Whilst I agree with some of your points the main problem facing young pilots today is the traditional pipeline has disappeared.
That is because the traditional licencing structure also disappeared. Pre-J.A.R (in the UK) the basic unstructured CPL was a 700 hour licence. Civilian pilots traditionally travelled this part of the pipeline via general aviation opportunities. Remunerated flight instruction could be carried out at the circa 150 hour level with nothing more than PPL and a basic instructional rating. J.A.R modified the licencing regime to bring the UK (and other countries) into line with most other ICAO signatory states, whereby the CPL was the vehicle for basic instruction and other GA level job opportunities. In recognition of that reality the experience levels were reduced to the 250 hour level, again in line with most other ICAO states. There had been a previous "approved course" distinction for a few specified full time courses of regulated training whereby the CPL hour requirement was circa 200 hours. Only a few FTO's were approved to conduct these courses. Post J.A.R these "approved courses" evolved in to the integrated courses offered by the same schools or their successors, as well as a few newcomers to the market.
The evolution broadly resulted in a co-incidence of the licencing changes together with the rapid expansion of new lo-cost airline entrants to the general market. Unfortunately many ordinary CPL aspirants believed that the licence changes meant "
we are all ripe candidates for airline jobs now" when in fact that wasn't really the case at all. That confusion was exacerbated by one or two
Lo-Co CEO's who publicly promoted the idea of single pilot flight decks. Unable to run with that idea, they then promoted the idea of taking the lowest licence requirements and offering the opportunity to anybody who wanted to pay a £50 fee and take their chances. The success of the
lo-co's not only resulted in a rapid expansion of that sector, but forced established and legacy carriers to adopt many of the low cost strategies in one form or another in order to survive. Many of them didn't survive.
Many of these legacy and established airlines, and indeed some of the new market entrant lo-co's, went to the other side of the "pipeline" and looked again at the "approved schools." These were now the principle integrated fATPL course providers. They could offer ab-initio airline trained cadets directly into the airlines "cadet programmes." The airlines liked the product and the economics and this sector started to rapidly expand.
Then came the recession and global "credit crunch." This suppressed and masked the expansion, but it didn't suppress the infrastructure and investment for future growth that these providers were intending to provide.
The result being that first tier airlines emerging from recession now sourced an increasing percentage of their F/O requirement through these tied and integrated programmes. This suppressed a good deal of the historic movement from the "stepping stone" jobs, and from the ex-military career changers.
At about the same time all of this was happening, general statutory changes were also occurring in many developed countries, that resulted in increased retirement ages, sometimes by as much as 10 years as it applied to this specific industry. This took the pressure off the left seat demand and allowed many airlines a significant breathing space in their right seat recruitment plans, (where indeed there was any expansion taking place at all.) From inside it wasn't difficult to see the evolution taking place. If anybody could be bothered to look behind the "
pardon our dust" hoardings of the big three FTO's, it wasn't difficult to see where the opportunities were likely to stem from either. A few people (including myself) have been banging on about this for many years now for anybody that might be interested. Some were, and some weren't, and some simply stuck their fingers in their ears and refused to believe anything other what they wanted or needed to believe. I am more than happy for anybody to go back through my own posting history to verify the point.
Reality is in the UK, when you leave flight school you have a bare minimum of experience. But there are no magical entry level jobs sitting there. Instruction, at my local club with the exception of one all instructors are airline pilots who do it as a hobby (I agree with this as they have more experience to give). Cargo or charter? Jobs are very few and very far between.
Yes. But there is "flight school" and there is "flight school" and the selection and methodology (for all the reasons mentioned above) will often dictate where those "magical entry level" jobs are. Usually they are the right seat of an A320 or 737 type variant. Outside of these programmes it is a very cold world with very few vacancies. As the OP's post highlights yet again, the T&C's on offer make these few vacancies "stepping stones" in themselves, often in locations very far from home. Indeed even as "stepping stones" the further harsh reality is that the aspired to companies with the better T&C's are often satisfying their own right seat requirements through their own established cadet programmes. Far too many people delude themselves that these "stepping stone" pumpkins, will transform themselves into Cinderella's carriage, once they have jumped on board. They don't!