emergency000 - I run an engineering facility. Let me show you how things play out from the other side of the fence.
I regularly get young, enthusiastic people coming through looking for jobs as AME's and to build SOE. That's great as everyone has to start somewhere. We've taken a few on over time.
Now, to train someone, I have to assign them a LAME. This takes out of the LAME's day checking their work when he could be being productive on a customers aircraft making the company money. Initially this would be almost continuous until the scope of their knowledge and skills is realised. After that, the level of supervision is slowly scaled back until they are almost autonomous in line with their capabilities.
Also, whilst they're learning, they generally do the job slower and take more time. Which is fine for getting the work done right, but I'm the one who has to justify the hours to the customer. I can't justify charging 4-5 hours for a 2 hour job just because an AME needs the SOE.
And generally, once all their training is done, they come and stand before me with their freshly minted engineers license.....and a resignation letter. Because they're a LAME now and they want to go and chase the type ratings and big bucks at the airlines, biz-jets etc.
So I've invested heavily in getting them licensed only to have them leave at the time where I should be seeing a return on the investment. For a small operator like us, its a pretty devastating financial blow as we have to go through the whole process again.
If AME's were willing to provide a return of service for getting their license, I'm sure a lot more would get jobs.