Every diveboat Captain I’ve met was retired from something else so the pension counted toward the income but most seemed to be doing it just to get out, not for the money.
The last few years at Beneath the Sea there has been a Captains school in one of the booths. He was telling me you need a lot of shipboard time toward your license but the good news is those logged boat dives count toward the hours, I hope you have been keeping a log and have done some liveaboards :)