to be fair, $450 in 1959, adjusted for GDP, is equal to more than $3000 a month today. As a new hire back then, things were rosier...at least as pay was concerned. Today, United airlines pays new hires less than $2000 dollars a month...Much less 48 years later. Pathetic.
Yes, your point is well taken. But that was my point also. In 1959, motel rooms were about $10 to $15 a night. Thirty nights in a motel would pretty well eat up the entire month's pay.
How did we make it? All 8 of us in the new-hire class rented one large room with extra cots and beds. That cut costs to a few dollars a night. Thirty years later I retired off the 747-400. A little inconvenience in ground school was an investment in the future.
Who knows what a new hire at United will eventually fly. That is the rest of my point.