Is this actually true?

Training program with most commercial pilot flight schools are some 250-300 hours -

Then you can get hired as air taxi-charter pilot in Africa and other parts of the world -

In North America pilots generally acquire flight experience as flight instructor -

The 1,500 hours you mention is the minimum required to get airline transport pilot licence -

It does not mean you will be hired as pilot with an airline -

It is just the "name" of the licence - "ATPL" airline transport pilot licence -

Actually, as per ICAO, first officers (co-pilot) are required to have commercial pilot licence -

That would be with as little as, say 300 hours total time -

And a type rating if it applies for larger airplanes -

You might get hired as a "Twin Otter" co-pilot somewhere in Central Africa...?

And that company might be called [something] Airline...

You will even carry and load the passenger's luggage into the airplane -

Be careful to place the chicken in their cages on top of the bags -

Most new commercial pilots end up doing any type of non-airline commercial flying (often flight instruction) to build up time. This would include flying charters, pipeline patrol, traffic patrol, towing banners or sailplanes, etc.

The requirement that even copilots on regional airliners have an Airline Transport Pilot license, which requires 1500 hours, is a pretty recent change. It was a knee jerk response to the Calgon Air crash in Buffalo. I would not be surprised to see it modified in the future - right now there are more unemployed pilots that jobs, but 10 or 15 years from now it may be hard to find new hires that can meet the requirements. It's already been shown that an extra 1000 hours in a Cessna 172 does little to improve the skills needed to fly a transport.

(1) This is true. At flight school you will not receive more than 250 hours. If you paid for 1,500 hours, including the necessary multi-engine experience the price tag would come close to $300,000. What the vast majority of flight school graduates do is obtain a flight instructor certificate and spend 2-4 years teaching others how to fly.

(2) It is unnecessary to say "commercial airline pilot'. Just say "airline pilot" because all airlines are commercial by nature. There aren't any private or non-commercial airlines.

The 1500 hours is a recent change to the FAA requirements for an airline pilot in the USA. It does not necessarily apply to pilots in other career paths or in other countries.

You GET 1500 hours of Pilot In Command experience by flying airplanes. You can fly air taxi charters, fly machine parts deliveries, pretty much any kind of job you can get that involves flying an airplane. It takes MOST young pilots 5-10 years to build up enough experience to meet the minimum standards.

I expect the increasing use of unmanned drones over USA airspace will take away some of the more traditional methods of building hours, like pipeline and electrical transmission line patrols.

I believe I heard of that, but I don't remember who told me about the 1500 hours. I think that's something having to do with practice or training. Good Luck.

Yes that is usually true. Most Airline pilots have military flight experience and that is where they get the required hours. Only other way to acquire those type of hours is to rent air craft and fly. Most US carriers require a minimum of 3000 hours. Good Luck

Hear again

That 1500 hours is likely 'pilot in command of a complex aircraft'

before anybody will even consider hiring you, and you don't even start on that till you're finished with your private license and

complex aircraft certificate.

You rent, You get a non-airline job; in other words you PAY DUES.

no