Regardless of the airline you fly, I think status, even the lowest tier status, is well worth the price of a buy-up or a couple of mileage runs. In irrops, especially the big ones like snowstorms and hurricanes, just being able to get an agent on the phone without competing with the thousands of general members is worth a lot, and even with long wait times you're still getting a "preferred" level agent. Having faster access to agents, and access to theoretically "better" agents, can be the difference between a day's delay to get home, and four days.

To me, it's like insurance. Pay for it and hope you never need it.