My point is simply this: US airlines could easily solve the issues of the pilot shortage and the embarrassingly low regional pilot pay, (which CAUSED the pilot shortage),...... IF they wanted to. And it wouldn't cost them a lot off of the top line or the bottom line.

To my way of thinking, it's closer to a rounding error than an additional cost. Yet apparently they would rather remain stingy and blame congress for the pilot shortage that they, themselves, have created.