For all that people complain, the one person that “leaves” in frustration there is another person lined up to take her/his place. Frequent flyer programs are living off the illusion of programs that have long since disappeared. Soon nobody at DL will getting free F upgrades as all of the seats will be sold for cash. They require boat loads of points for international premium awards. Yet still people charge billions to their DL AMEX cards.

AS will be just fine. They can live without the Mileage Runners. The occasional flyers are better off just getting an airline credit than earning status by flying. Those close to lifetime status will remain on the hamster wheel not realizing that years from now when they achieve it there may be few tangible benefits left. FF programs have been very effective at duping people into believing that all the extra money spent will be worth it over time —as in the past it was.

Now each airline cuts and cuts and yet people don’t jump off the wheel. Where the cuts end, it is anybody’s guess but AS simply follows what the others do simply with a lag of a couple years.