Originally Posted by directbears

I will try. First it’s not necessarily the amount of total time or how long it took you to get your time, but the QUALITY of your flight time and the EXPERIENCE that you have.

Let's take your 400-500 PFT that has flown around the patch doing the required "training" (half of which is probably in some sim) and doing some cross country work mostly VFR. Then you have two other groups of pilots. Military and civilian 135/CFI types. Both are excellent ways to gain QUALITY EXPERIENCE and not just flying around under some 91 or 141 ticket.

First Military.
While I personally believe from having flown with ex and current military guys that they do well learning systems, flying the aircraft, and making command decisions, they are initially soft in areas such as working in the ATC environments and with an airline/ATC hectic schedule (at times). However, they quickly adapt and draw off of their military flying experience. I’m not military, but I do respect them and have confidence in their ability to fly 121 aircraft.

Second 135/CFI types.
The CFI route, IMHO, is a good starting point because it allows you to hone in on your aircraft knowledge more than you could imagine as a newly "qualified" commercial pilot. The flying experience gained is OK up to a point. Teaching and observing other pilots will give you a sharp eye and some experience but it does fall short in some areas like dealing with "real" weather and fast paced schedules. Again IMHO, the best place to gain some "real" world experience (i.e. aircraft emergencies, bad weather, schedules, etc.) is at 135 operators, preferably cargo ops. You will find yourself in some real interesting situations flying 135 cargo, and you will be able to take a wealth of knowledge and experience away from that. I have done both, so I know what I’m talking about. I have the utmost respect and confidence in a pilot who has spent some time chasing TS and knocking ice of the wing under 135 cargo ops.

What does a PFT with 500 hours have to show other than the ability to pass a check ride and possibly hold a type rating that doesn't hold water without any actual PIC time using it? It's amazing to me reading the PFT folk’s posts here. It's amazing how arrogant most of you come across, and how you CONSTANTLY miss the point. YES, you can pass a check ride that ALL of us can pass including “Bam Bam” the monkey, but when the doo doo hits the fan in the real world, in the real aircraft, in the real weather, while being pushed by a real schedule, what EXPERIENCE are you going to draw off of? Can any of you answer me that?

Respect the profession and gain some “real” experience is all I have left to say. It very well might save your life and bring you out of an ever deepening pit of overworked, underpaid treatment by airline management scumbags who will use your own desperate desires to be a shiny new airline pilot against you.