I plan to travel to MEM - MXP in October and booking prices are reasonable at the moment. I am seeing $747 in basic economy and $947 in main. Since I am Platinum and have an AA credit card, most of the restrictions for basic are overridden by my status (paying for bags, boarding group number, etc). However, I have no idea if the amount of LP I earn would be different, apart from the obvious difference in the ticket price.

Are there any downsides in booking basic vs main for flyers with higher status?

Thanks!

Base earnings rate on Basic Economy is 2 miles/LPs per dollar, compared to 5 miles/LPs per dollar on "regular" Economy. There is also a fee to get a future travel credit if you cancel a Basic Economy ticket.

Thanks. So are are all ‘regular’ economy flights 5x or are there differences between Main, Main Plus, and Premium Economy?

Thanks

so it's 8 miles/LP per dollar for regular tickets and 3.2miles/LP per dallar for BE tickets. costs $199 to cancel BE ticket. i wont be too concerned about the cancellation fees (at least ime), if one cancel much less than the number of BE flights they actually take over the long term, the savings could more than netoff the fees after factoring in the value of miles & LPs for me. but you have to do your own math as everyone value miles and LP differently

8 LP/$ is for regular tickets. BE are 2 LP/$ + 60% bonus for Plat = 3.2 LP/$

All non-Basic-Economy fares (including Business and First Class fares) have a base earnings rate of five miles/LPs per pre-tax dollar on AA metal (and on a few partners' metal too).

Thanks everyone for the explanations. I will go for Main Economy as I might make Plat Pro this year !

Is that the cost to cancel an international BE ticket, such as the one the OP is contemplating?

oh yup im referring to the regular tickets. i forgot about the bonus on BE tickets. what i wanted to point out was that even with the bigger difference in miles/LP earn rate (8 to 3.2 vs 5 to 2) and the $199 cancellation fee, the savings could it worth it

if you value 1 mile at 1.5cents and 1 LP at 1.5 cents*, then the BE ticket will give $71.71 of value, while the regular ticket will give $227.28 of value. so you saved 44.43, so it can still be worth it if you fly 5 BE and cancel the 6th one

* i put the value of LP at 1.5cents because it is approx opportunity cost to earn LP; i could have earned 2x bank points instead of earning 1 LP and 1 mile for each dollar spent on an aa card, so the opportunity cost of the LP is roughly the value of a bank point. hte math is better for BE tickets if you vale LP less

my bad. that's $199