These "rankings" have ZERO validity. Last year United was on the bottom of THIS ranking. How have they improved? The CEO there stepped down, but nothing has really changed or improved. There are about 100 "rankings" throughout the year. I can't remember which it was, but AA was in the top 3 in one of them. These things are like rottentomatoes reviews on movies. You might actually like a movie everyone hates and hate a movie everyone likes. Just because this one is from the WSJ means nothing. Notice in the bottom notes, the author of this articles used "rankings" of his choice to make HIS "rankings".

Here's where ratings matter.....when the customer selects "show by price lowest to highest" on their search for a ticket. That's the only ranking that matters.