I can attest personally to their unwillingness to match status. I was 1P on UA and called and told them my company would like me to fly AA, but I was unwilling to unless I had some status in the airline. So, if they would give me status, I would book several international flights with them that minute, otherwise I was going back to UA. There was no budge, only thing offered was the challenge mentioned above (which cost $160 I believe).

I later found out that AA had an agreement with my employer to match status up to Platinum. ^ If you work for a large corporation, it's worth looking into.