Originally Posted by
Zeeb
The amount from the card is only 2 points/dollar though. The rest you still get no matter what you use to buy the ticket. And on all non Delta purchases you just get a straight up 1 point/dollar. There is an opportunity cost to use the Delta card vs something else so your rebate numbers aren't accurate.
Say someone spends $2,300 on tickets (assume $300 are taxes so not MQD) and $5,000 elsewhere in a month using a Delta card and you end up with
General member: 15,300 miles
Silver: 19,300 miles
Gold: 21,300 miles
Plat: 23,300 miles
Diamond: 27,300 miles
Now say someone spends that same amount in a month on the same things with a non-Delta card that gives 1% cash back
General member: 10,000 miles + $73
Silver: 14.000 miles + $73
Gold: 16,000 miles + $73
Plat: 18,000 miles + $73
Diamond: 22,000 miles + $73
And that assumes there are no bonus categories like groceries/gas or anything else where they can earn more than 1%. You could do the same calculation for any card with the $73 being replaced by whatever you get for spending $7,300 on that card.
My point is that, even ignoring the DL Amex, you get more than a 1% rebate on DL spend just from the RDM earned by flying.
Using your numbers, a general member spending $2,300 on DL tickets, of which 2,000 are MQD, earns 10k RDM.
If DL goes to straight $0.01/RDM redemption, that's $100 back off $2,300, or 4.3%. Yes, that rebate has to be "spent" on DL, but I don't consider that a restraint for most people posting in this forum. And that person can still put the spend on whatever CC they want that maximizes non-SkyMiles returns.
In sum, I think that valuation should be considered to keep things in perspective when everyone here flips out about how terrible DL redemptions are. For some, they are worse/harder than in the past, yes. But viewed as a rebate-type program, they aren't really all that bad. Heck, with the numbers above, it's at least twice as good as the Costco Exec Membership that so many people love.