Originally Posted by dukieee
...that raises the interesting question why anybody would pay $11k instead of using 135k miles. If you don't have the miles, why not hire me and let me fly around the world in coach for a few days (reading books and visiting places), collect miles and give them to you? Mutually beneficial deal I'd say!
Right. The underlying issue is that the "value" of the service provided is not really $11k, and the marginal cost to the airline to provide the service is not really $11k. So it is not surprising that FF miles allow one to obtain many tickets at below the price charged by the airline.