Andrew Sarangan writes:

I agree that medicals are excessively restrictive, but that has been
slowly changing.

VERY slowly changing.

I figure that a private pilot is far less likely to take anyone with him if he
kills himself in an accident than is an automobile driver, so why the
restrictive medical requirements? A pilot's only victims are likely to be his
passengers, if any, but someone crashing on the highway can cause many
injuries and deaths.

A good first step would be to dramatically reduce the requirements for
piloting alone, while (perhaps) maintaining somewhat more stringent
requirements for pilots who want to take passengers with them. However, I'm
not convinced that the chances of sudden incapacitation are really high enough
to worry about in any case.

Also, based on accident records, having a special
rating for retract makes perfect sense. If the FAA does not, the
insurance companies will (and do) impose extra conditions for flying a
retract.

I don't think insurance should be mandatory for pilots, either.

Anyone without a serious physical handicap, about $5k of cash and
average or even below average intelligence can become a pilot in a few
months. Even if you are talking about becoming a professional pilot,
there are places that will train you from zero for about $50k.

Yeah, I saw an ad for $42K. But I'm sure there are a great many prerequisites
for admission to the school.