In the end you got to ask yourself "why does my captain live in a trailer park"? Numbers can be very misleading. Firefighters all have new 40K trucks with campers and a boat attached. Teachers go on vacation to Peru. Pilots are poor. Calculate the truth and it will scare you.
Firemans with nice shiny trucks with huge 40k car note at the bank. Just cause someone has nice stuff doesn't mean they are not dirt poor. Doctor's actually have a very high bankruptcy rate. Anyone can take a vacation to Peru on credit.
Should doctors, lawyers, and other professionals have to figure in the time they sit in traffic, massive overtime they put in every week, all the paperwork, & endless time in training and studying?
There are more doctors and lawyers manufactured from universities every year that almost every other profession. The suicide rate and health rate of doctors and lawyers are higher than the national norm. A book called the Millionaire Next Store says that doctors are much more likely to be bad money managers and be in worse financial shape that the average public. Why? Bigger house, bigger car, bigger credit, less time to concern themselves with those issues.
Life is hard. Every profession has it's ups and downs. I am in the IT field and I am great at it but I don't like it. When I get tired of flying I will move onto something else. If the dream for piloting is gone then the American Dream is dead completely and we should close shop. With that said no one should go into the piloting field without knowing the realities, pitfalls, and not have a realistic plan to fight the potential problems....