Originally Posted by
Bwipilot
My guess is that early retirements are much more valuable at other airlines since it reduces displacements between fleet types--especially when the retirements are mainly from fleets that won't fly again soon in any case. Alas, at SWA, there's little cost to downgrading a bunch of captains and furloughing FOs--maybe two months of furlough pay and 15 trips of right seat pay for the downgrade. The SWA CEO is an accountant first and foremost---who realizes quickly that there's not much money saved by offering early retirements.
The most insightful statement made on this thread so far. The other big 3 have a lot more to gain through early retirements due to the cost of retraining. It's a ripple effect on their entire cost of doing business.