I don't get why. They still serve more cities to europe and Asian than we do.

They always have. But they do less than they used to.

There are a lot more factors than pilot pay that figure into international code shares and long range and wide body flying.

Do you really think these agreements happen simply because of the difference in cockpit costs between the two carriers?
You are overestimating your importance in this equation.

Get two Sharpie markers, 1 red for AA, 1 blue for British Airways.

Now draw nonstop flights from the UK to the United States for each airline.

Go by another blue Sharpie marker when you run out of blue ink for BA.

Apples and oranges. Other than phx or bos none of those city pairs to London would be served by AA and I gurantee you without the JV we wouldn't be doing all the UK, Ireland flying or all the London flying we are doing now.

It’s not about the number of cities, it’s about block hours. I’d rather have 50 flights to LHR than 25 flights to different cities in Europe.

BA runs those from a massive hub in LHR. Like the last guy said no way we’d fly TPA/BWI/MSY etc to LHR if they weren’t a codeshare partner.

I think the difference is that BA flies just about everywhere from their hub. I believe their Group 4 acft represent 40%+ of the total fleet. AA has a bigger hub in DFW yet we only operate a fraction of the international flying on a percentage basis. It’s complex to operate and expensive. I think Parker and team would rather just codeshare that flying and work on more 321/737 city pairs.

I'm actually surprised, I would think BA's costs are higher. So maybe not just about costs.

some interesting info.
https://garfors.com/2013/03/the-worl...airlines-html/