Originally Posted by
Slow learner
Logic would dictate that the airlines will always keep this information pretty close hold. If it is a huge number everbody immediately gets disillusioned with the FF Program because the competition for awards is so great, if the number is frightenly low people start to question the viabilitiy of the airline or at least the program.
Now if you want to feel special about your own status, or boost your self-esteem, there are many far more pleasant ways of doing that than strapping an aluminum tube to your backside for half a year with 250 of your newest best friends.
That last sentence was not nice and certainly not constructive, but if you want to know my motives for asking are simple: curiosity and estimating my likelihood of upgrades. For example, during the last 12 months we had a large number of MQM promotions and a recession; I am curious to know if the number of PMs is up or down.
I don't agree with your assessment
in bold. The numbers are only relevant when compared to previous years. Knowing there are, say 150k PMs now does not provide us much information. But if we were told, in addition, that there were 450k PMs in 2009 (or 50k PMs) that would be valuable information for current PMs.
I am sure that large investors have access to this information and was really hoping that we would get some real estimates (in addition to a few jokes).