The 50 seaters are going away anyway due to poor economics, so why give management more 76 seaters as sympathetic bonus? It's not like they're gonna keep the 50 seaters if you don't give them more 76 seaters.

A 76 seater can do DEN-CHS, DEN-SYR, DEN-DTW, DEN-RIC, DEN-ATL, etc... flights that can and should be done on a 319... a 50 seater can't do that. Why give them more opportunities to use E175s and CRJ7s instead of A319s/737-700s?

Also, replacing four 50 seaters that are doing short haul flying with 30-40% load factors and replacing them with two 76 seaters that will be doing what should be mainline flying does actually give more lift capability since the 76 seaters will have more than double the load factor.