Sailing,
IMO doing the category list (stove piped) like you guys propose is where the whole ratio thing breaks down. I agree that a pure DOH list is unfair to you guys, (yes I would love it), but your attempt to "rationalize" the list drops me 4% vs my current NWA list. I'm just under half way up as a 9/95 hire and the percentage gets worse as you go towards the bottom of the stovepipe, to the point you run out of premerger Delta guys and 404 exNWA guys are at the bottom.
Lots of problems with a pure DOH list including bad year group management, ie you hired when we didn't and vise versa (I call it a saw tooth list) but of the two I would argue that DOH is "cleaner" than the stove pipe.
Good discussion, don't ya wish we could be flies on the wall and hear the pros discuss this? What ya wanna bet we are close to their arguments......and why we're still fighting about this 7 months later.
Hope to see ya in NRT sometime your 777 dudeness!
Ferd