The reason they cost more is that they dont want to sell those seats to non connecting pax.
Your assumption goes all wrong when you think they could fill that regional with 50 pax paying 600 bucks each.
They want to fill those seats with premium pax paying 3000 with the connection in J/F.

 

Now you just need to expand that Revenue per seat mile and equate it to the number of seats, and how far those seats will go in a typical day.
Even though a 777 and an RJ fly at roughly the same speed the 777 pilot moves many more seats over a longer distance in the same time interval that we get paid for. The RJ may get just as much per seat mile, but it is only generating 50-76 seats worth of money to hand to the pilots instead of the 314-396 seats that a 777 moves. Yes we move just as many passengers as the 777 in a day, but with more legs. WHich means more taxi time where seat miles are effectively 0.
A 6 hour payday on a CJR will mean 3-6 legs, which will mean at least 1.5 hours of that 6 hours is taxiing, thus not generating revenue.
Then how much time is spent on those 3-6 legs climbing at a slower speed, descending into the pattern and approach and landing at a slower speed, all while that 777 is cruising along at altitude at .84 for the majority of it's day.
Yes the regional pilots work harder than, in the same environments (or worse) as, into and out of the same airports as the major pilots, but economics just don't support paying the RJ guy the same as the folks flying the bigger metal per hour. Wish it were not true and I'd get a huge raise, but my meager economics understanding wasn't learned from a Berkeley professor so it's just a bit more realistic.

 

Your entire argument is flawed. RASM doesn't scale based on sector length, hence why Southwest is such a profitable airline. Selling a $250 airfare from Pittsburgh to Chicago (400 miles) doesn't mean a flight from Chicago to Narita costs $4,250. Quite the opposite actually. Shorter segments allow higher utilization dilution amongst revenue units (seats per trip).

A 737 flying 8 sectors a day is spreading its fixed asset costs out over 1,000+ passengers, while a 777 is spreading its (higher) fixed costs amongst 300 passengers, or at the most 600 (two flights).

An RJ operating 6-8 sectors is spreading its fixed costs out over more units than a 777, and the RJ's fixed costs are much less.

You falsely assume long haul flying is the most profitable. It is not at all. Dense, high frequency domestic flying is.

 

Yeah the best thing that long haul does for the bottom line is to encourage customer loyalty, so they stick with you when they fly domestic.

 

Scope is the reason that Delta can say this. Scope limits how much the company can farm out. It prevents the very whipsaw that strips the regional pilot groups of leverage. If the pilots at Delta we’re to say no to concessions, with scope maxed out they can’t give the flying away. They could reduce flying or furlough, but that would trigger scope clause provisions forcing a reduction in regional flying as well.

 

Let’s do this, the 50 seat jet on that route makes $300 per seat while the 777 makes makes 500 per seat (averaging selling half the first class seats). 50x300=$15000 revenue for the single RJ flight, and 300x500=150000. So the 777 makes a bunch more for the single flight, but in the 10 hours the 777 is doing that one flight(including the loading and unloading) the RJ did 7 1 hr flights generating $105000 in revenue. Now let’s look into costs, the RJ captain$75hr, fo$45hr, and fa$25 hr can stay with the plane and work all 7 hours of flights over the 10 hour day which brings total crew cost to $145 or $1450 for the full 10 hours. The 777 will need 1 captain $350hr 2FOs$230hr ea, and at least 6fa at $25hr. Which brings the hourly cost to $960 per hour or $8160 for the 8.5 hour flight. Next is fuel the 50 seater burns 3000lbs hr max for 7 hours means that it used 21,000lbs(3230 gallons) . The 777 burns at least 13000 lbs an hour for a total of 110500lbs(17000 gallons) at $2 gallon the RJ used $6460 while the 777 used $34000 in fuel.
Now the totals
777 brought in $150000
Spent $8160 on crew and $34000 on fuel
Revenue after very basic operating cost $107840

The regional brought in $105000
Spent $1450 on crew and $6460 on fuel
Revenue after basic operating cost is $97090

So over the course of the day the 777 brought in slightly more than the regional, this was assuming best case numbers for the 777 and worse case for the regional. Averaged out per hour of flight the revenue after basic operating cost is with in 10% of a 777 yet pilot wage is 5-8x less per hour

 

WB averaging 500 per seat? Your airline is going bankrupt in a hurry.

What ticket prices did you use per class to come up with that number? You know there are often only 20 to 30 seats available in the cheapest fare buckets?

Edit. You did say worst case for WB, but thats nowhere near realistic even as the worst case scenario.

 

There are ALL sort of items that go into the full cost to run a WB vs and RJ. Back of napkin isn't going to cut it. We don't have the tools to compare revenue and costs.

 

You're in a regional thread explaining mainline leverage. Regionals do not rely on scope for negotiating leverage.

What strips the regional pilots of leverage is they can get ANY regional to do the flying. Scope just says how large a plane the regional can fly, and in some cases limits destination pairings. Who does that flying is a matter of winning a contract bid.
So, there is nothing preventing them from telling PDT pilots to take these concessions or we are transferring the flying to TSA. THAT is the whipsaw game at regionals, not scope.

As long as the flying farmed to the regionals is transferable, regional pilots have very limited leverage.

 

This is correct.

It's possible we will see more leverage in the near future, if a regional or two go out of business and the industry consolidates. The more Skywest/Republic can charge, the better it is for all the pilots involved.