I'd be more concerned abouta human going insane than malware.
I'd imagine they're mostly fly by wire anyway, so a virus could theoretically just disable the human input.
There's a big difference between isolating a single control link vs an entire control system comprising of, at least, a corpus database and all the supporting code that streams inputs and actuates outputs.
Modern U.S. submarines are also fly-by-wire, but hydraulic overrides are in the engine room in case of emergency.
"Person there just in case to take over in the rare case of emergencies" might not be as well paid as "person who's responsible for the plane at all times". Plus, if you're concerned about malware, you'll probably want a person still involved in vetting the code outputted by some hypothetical AI, so there would still be at least some engineering jobs.
Almost everyone requires the same "kind of currency", but that doesn't stop salaries from being different.
> The person flying all the time will be much more capable than the person watching the plane fly, and acquiring experience only in specific training.
If the plane can be piloted mostly automatically, that doesn't necessarily matter. What matters only is if the emergency person can handle the emergencies that do occur.
To be clear, I don't have any strong belief that human pilots will disappear any time soon; I just don't think the arguments people are making here are that compelling, because they seem to be assuming that the skill level of flying a plane is much too high for an automatic pilot. As someone who's been skeptical of fully automated driving for a long time now despite popular opinion seeming far more optimistic about it in the short term, it's kind of ironic to see "humans will always be better at flying" presented as axiomatic.
Certainly things like the ghimli glider are better for having a human at the helm, but those sorts of things shouldn't happen.
but there may also be enough kinds of failure—and routine—scenarios where computers do a better job, so on balance they could be much better, just killing a few people in the most absurd situations that would never fool a human. You can't guesstimate reason these things, need statistics.
also, if automated systems have a bright future for us, maybe we have to sacrifice a few people on the QA team in order to get there.