I think this will lower the population of points/miles over time (from flying at least). Additionally, my experience is that the people that have millions of miles from flying tend not to spend their miles and actually hold most of them.

I work with 3 people that have or will retire soon. All brag about their mile balance. All have millions of unused miles from years of business travel, one of them has over 1M on Delta, AA, & United.

My point is some of the people that are big winners in this new scheme, won't even cash their miles.

In the end, if less miles are cashed with this change, then United can sell more miles to Chase. Get more $$$$. I assume that is the plan.

Kind of like before AA went bankrupt and was selling miles like crazy to Citi. Back when it was easy to get a 75-100k sign up bonus.