I'm intrigued how you feel the industry gives you "a pretty good standard of living", Scottish guy, when by your own account, its not providing you any living at all.
I'm not complaining about my own lot; I'm a wide-body Captain and have been fortunate enough to maintain a reasonable career path. But I'm very much aware that if I was starting out today it would be much less rosy. But that situation has arisen, at least in part, because of people like you who treat aviation as a hobby and are prepared to occupy a professional pilot's seat for the "privilege of getting airborne".