Originally Posted by
halls120
I disagree. How can you devalue something that is already zero? When I first started flying United, I was a silver, and I never even thought of getting an upgrade. In the long run, dangling a carrot in front of silvers is more damaging than it is a positive. Going back to e500s would actually improve their chances for an upgrade from none to slim.
I'm not saying it's a rational position.
I'm just saying there's a large chunk of elites out there who don't think about this as much as FTers do and all they will hear is "no more free upgrades" without ever thinking the next step which is "whatever, I have never and will never get upgraded anyway." These are the same people who are already pissed off that they don't get free upgrades. Telling them "you're right, you're never going to get upgraded so we'll just go ahead and take that theoretical benefit away from you" won't make them any happier.
And there will be a chunk of fliers who have never gotten upgraded but firmly believe in the principle of past performance not being an indicator of future performance. So they don't get that they will never get upgraded. So they will be upset that the mere chance at an upgrade is being taken away from them.