i'd personally take the advice regarding upgrades with a grain of salt. many people here are very pampered and will pay big bucks for business. Also I think that the average flyertalker is well above average income and therefore has less use for money.

It is true that you will get much more value for our money if you would have actually paid 7K for a business ticket to europe. If like many americans you are struggling for money and business class is an unnecessary luxury than domestic tickets can make plenty of sense. A ticket is only worth what you would pay for it, not what they charge for it.

As others have said, its an individual choice. I normally value my miles at about 1 cent apiece. A little more if they are AA miles. This is primarily because I really don't care about flying buisiness class. If you had only one free ticket, I'd probably value them a little higher because there is a good likelihood of needing one very expensive ticket at some point. I do not think most of us will need 12 emergency tickets.