Originally Posted by j1b3h0

Okay, I'll keep flogging the horse: On one hand we have a large number of big airplane pilots leading the charge for higher barriers to entry. And on the other, less experienced pilots saying "Hey, I did it and turned out OK, so what's the problem?" And, of course, we have the starving CFIs, who, while struggling to pay off their college loans, and get enough time to get hired, cry "Not fair!" to raising the bar.

One question: Doesn't it strike you as weird that the FARs require a great deal MORE experience to fly bank boxes, single-pilot in a light twin than they do to occupy a seat of a freaking AIRLINER? To me, if you can't do the former, you're too inexperienced to do the later!

If you'll pardon my outrageous opinion, the substantive prerequisites for becoming an airline crew member should be previous flying jobs that require daily DECISION making, while working in an airplane: How much payload. How much fuel. Can I go in this weather, with this MEL, and so on. You get to work, at 9PM in Pourin#ss rain, and there's 2000lbs of wet mailbags on the ramp, and the boss says "throw it on your Chieftain and get outa here". After a thousand hours of THAT, then you're ready for an airliner.

Arguably, it takes 1000 hours for an airline crew member to be worth a darn in each seat...there's that much more to learn AFTER you get there. I posit that if one lacks the lessons learned from the prerequisite courses, he won't learn them in an airline cockpit. The boating community calls this type of person a "hazard to navigation".