Honestly, in my experience as a newer PHX lineholder, I don't ever overblock a significant amount. The west coast system is 99% VFR and the hubs are for the most part a complete cake walk getting in and out of. There is the occasional hold for flow into PHX but it's nothing significant. To put things in perspective, I have only had to deice once this entire winter season. ONCE.

Now for the guys based in places like MSP and ORD, then I'm sure it is a completely different story. I'm not trying to defend our contact, but for us west coasters it wouldn't make a huge difference either way and there are plenty of other issues that need to be addressed in our contract.