I'd like to start by saying that I agree that pilots are under-compensated for their training and experience. You have no argument there.

However, I don't think current pilots can have as much control on their situation as you hope they can. The truth is that the factors of supply and demand are not in the favor of pilots, and pilots are not a unified group. The concerns of a regional captains who are making enough to get by even if they are grossly under-compensated aren't going to be very convincing to a CFI who is struggling to bring in students while having no health insurance and barely making (or not even making) enough to pay rent each month. And to the new commercial pilot/CFI with tens of thousands of dollars of debt who can't find work looks at that CFI and wishes he could at least be making something.

The truth is, there is only so long someone will remain unemployed before they are willing to accept less pay, and there is only so long that someone will stay at a job where they can't make ends meet before being willing to accept something that will at least put enough food on the table. The truth is, that no matter how hard a union works for good pay and work rules at a company, if there are too many unemployed pilots or too many pilots stuck at a lower level of employment, a new airline will be able to hire pilots for less pay and worse work rules, undercut the unionized airline and put them out of business.

It seems to me that the solution to poor compensation for pilots lies more in correcting supply and demand issues than getting pilots to stick together. Regulation may help (proposed rules requiring an ATP for any 121 pilot could help though they would probably be meaningless if they included exceptions for graduates for certain types of aviation schools). What seems like it would make the most difference is if people were fully informed when making the decision to enter aviation.

New pilots need to know that they may never get that position with a major airline, and that they will struggle a long time before getting it (if they ever do) before they have drained tens of thousands of dollars into training. Unfortunately, there's good money to be made giving people false expectations to get them into training, so you're even fighting an uphill battle there.