As always, it's important to distinguish between ticket retail price and traveler willingness to pay (WTP). On any given day it's trivial to find redemption values of 3-4 cpm — for example, I could use my miles to buy a refundable coach ticket for friends or family who don't have status. But unless they're planning to otherwise buy said refundable ticket, I haven't actually gotten 3-4 cpm of value.

Another example: Using Citi TYP transfers to TK, I got something like >7 cpp last summer flying my in-laws out to California and Maui in UA premium cabins. Of course I was pleased with that. But I don't delude myself into thinking I truly got anything close to 7 cpp of "value" from it, because there's no way that I (or they) would have paid >$3,000 retail price of the tickets that I redeemed for.

For the vast majority of travelers (>95%), and even the vast majority of those on this board, it's hard to consistently get more than 2 cpm of true value from miles (as measured by WTP). Even for those who claim to do so, I'm skeptical. I don't mean to pick on James specifically, but if he didn't have a big stash of miles, would he really be paying retail price and continue taking all the flights he does? I have my doubts.