If only the market was as simple as this. The reason as with many things lies with the fact that when an industry has a small number of large employers, they can conspire to cap wages fairly easily without ever actually speaking to each other, and indeed it probably happens without any illegal conspiracy, just them banking on each other to not undercut.

It's been years since I was a student pilot, but it doesn't look like things have changed much. Back then, there were many commercial pilots at the low end, making peanuts. Only at the middle & upper levels do you really start to make money

It's a similar situation to National Park Rangers: there are so many people willing to do the job that wages are very low.