Back in the 60's there was a for real "pilot Shortage". My own father was approached as a newly graduated aerospace engineer with private pilots license and offered full training with pay to fly for a major airline. Guys with as little as 250 hours flew as FE and never spent one hour as a CFI.

The difference today is that back in the 1960's there was a real shortage of college educated pilots. Now every community college and mail order university is cranking out degrees by the boatload. Student loans have made financing flight training easy. It only takes a few scribbles of the pen and an ill informed co-signer.

In addition the fully automated flight deck world has made it so that even real flight skills are not all that necessary anymore. All that is required is the ability to learn through rote memorisation and basic computer skills.

SkyHigh