One reason I'm keeping this card is you can get to gold status with 30k spend. Gold is garbage with SPG but it's a bit more valuable with Marriott. Whenever teh programs merge or start offering reciprocal benefits, I hope to utilize it.
I think you can get gold by spending a certain amount on the ritz card but the earning is so dilute, I don't see any reason to hit that. I put spg in the same category as a 2% cb card.