Okay, so heres the rundown: Im 21 years old, am going to be a Junior in college majoring in business. Got my Private Pilot's Certificate back in highschool but havent flown much since because of college/time/money. It has always been my goal to be an airline, freight, or corporate pilot. I absolutely love flying, can talk about it all day, and often just drive out to the airport to watch planes or talk to other pilots about flying. HOWEVER, before anyone starts calling me a "starry-eyed kid" who has no idea about what he is getting into, I do know about many( obviously not all) of the drawbacks and negatives with the aviation industry. And I know that right now the airlines are really suffering because of this oil crisis. And its also very apparent that pilots salaries seem to keep dropping. Part of me thinks I should be looking into another industry, particularly healthcare. I dont really have a passion for the medical field, but the industry seems quite stable and most medical professionals obviously do quite well in regards to salary. I dont believe I would mind flying for several years with lower pay, but I dont want to have to wait ten years to atleast be making a respectable salary--I am going to consider respectable to be $75k/year. I dont plan on having kids anytime soon and I dont want to be married until I am atleast 35--and then that's even quite questionable because with a 50%+ divorce rate, I dont really know why anyone would ever want to get married anymore.

So basically, what do you think? Aviation is the only thing that I have a true passion for thus far in my life. But is that worth it to shell out probably atleast 20k-30k more for the rest of the flight training and flight time I will need? especially when I'm going into an industry where regional FO's earn $18k a year? I'm just curious, but assuming I get lucky and get on with a stable regional airline, how well could I be doing after 5 years in regards to pay/schedule?

I know there arent any truly right answers to these questions, but any insight is appreciated. How many of you guys/girls would go into a different field if you had to do it over again?