EBCI and BA's policy of charging for seat selection is where having status pays off. I have never, and would never, pay for EBCI, as my travel plans change frequently and I can't stomach losing the funds for something that may not pay off.

I booked several BA flights and it was well worth having One World elite status to be able to book seats for free. The $60 to $105 cost to select a seat without status on BA was hard to stomach before I gained OW status, given how frequently I might switch flights and schedules.

What's nice on AA is they reserve some preferred seats for elites until the day of travel, so an elite like me still has some hope of a not horrible seat if I were to switch for any reason. However, on the flip side of the coin, on popular flights many of the good seats are gone in advance, such as a flight next week where I was originally way back of the plane, but managed to move up as someone else changed their flights and freed up their preferred seat.