Yep. Someone might be able to capture some savings by using LSA's for some of it I guess, but GA has gone nuts with pricing. Some of today's costs are tied up in avionics, even for entry level planes. The flight school hook of "all glass" training for everything is just silly. It doesn't matter and no one cares if you had it on your first solo or cross country. Aviat even tried to help out by doing a C-152 "good as new" rebuild that amortized over all its costs was around $65/hr wet but no one was interested.

The good news is there is a gigantic relief valve available to the industry with the flip of a switch; drop the college requirement. While this has been a heated debate among pilots for a long time, there's no getting around the ease of instantly shaving off one or two hundred grand as a barrier to entry with a single memo. It will have to happen at some point, as the flight training part ain't getting any cheaper.

The really funny thing is watching the airlines squirm over pilots, panic and throw money at the bottom end with bonuses, referrals, flows and all that, yet continue to do nothing about the actual supply other than partner with universities with medical school cost structures. Even DL bought high and sold low with the Delta Connection Academy. They could have bought it back for a tiny fraction of the stonk burnbacks. It might even make more sense than a refinery.