For an airline speak neophyte, I'm wondering if you could explain this a little more. I'm not sure I understand what you mean by a PFT'er...don't almost all of us pay for advanced flight training (ATP, type ratings etc...) Why are these guys so much less capable/respected?
PFT is not paying for you basic flight training to get your licenses, it's paying for the training that the employer is required by either the FAA or insurance for you to fly for them.
For example, the airline says that they will hire you to fly their Beech 1900 as a First Officer however you have to pay the the airline what it cost them for your ground school, simulator training and checkride. The airline is required to give you this training by the FARs, but they make you pay it. They probably charged you $15,000 for the PFT while paying you a yearly salary of about $17,000. So in essence you worked your first year for $2,000. This is why PFTers are not respected.
As far as being less capable, do you want to put you family on an airline where the pilots have so little flying experience? The only reason the airline was willing to hire with so little experience was because they had no money to lose if the guy didn't make it through training. The pilot is paying for it himself and the airline has no financial risk.
Another example of PFT is a corporate operator hiring a pilot on the condition that the pilot pays for the type rating. Same thing....the risk is all on the pilot for training that is required by the FAA/ICAO (international flying) or insurance company. It also allows corporations to abuse pilots with things like 24/7 on call for 365 day of the year. If the pilot objects, he gets fired and has just blown 20 grand+ for the type. The company has no investment in him so they don't care if he sticks around or not - and they abuse the shit out of him.
5-7 years ago, PFT was huge in the regionals but now it is lessening there. Mostly because there has been a lot of regional hiring and the pool of those willing to PFT is drying up. But on the opposite side, PFT has been increasing in the corporate world as pilots have moved away from airlines looking for better economic security.