Still definitively trotting out the same baseless tropes without any semblance of a cogent argument or reasoning. A joint business covering a destination AA doesn’t fly “can’t possibly” be positive for AA’s employees. On what basis, pray tell, have you arrived at that gem?
Again – I could see that argument having some truth to it if, for example, AA were to establish a joint business partnership with a foreign carrier and then eliminate its own flying to that foreign market, thus theoretically sacrificing AA flights, and the accompanying AA staffing, at the altar of the joint business and the partner. But that is not now, nor has that even been, in any way applicable to the AA/QANTAS joint business, which covers a region the world where AA has not operated its own metal for two decades and had very little realistic prospect of starting its own service anytime soon, anyway. (And never mind that a joint business predicated on one carrier eliminating 100% of its capacity in the covered markets likely wouldn’t be deemed financial advantageous to the airlines themselves, let alone employees, but let’s set this reality aside for this little Magical Mystery Tour through Delta fantasyland.)
So in that context, what the joint business allows AA and QANTAS to do is coordinate their schedules and pricing to create the optimal revenue generation for both airlines, and in so doing, at least theoretically, funnel more passengers between AA planes in and out of HNL, LAX and DFW and QANTAS planes in and out of those same places. More passengers and more revenue for AA, without AA having to cut a single flight or job. So again I come back to: how was a single AA job harmed in any way by this arrangement? I'd love to hear an example of just one AA employee whose employment was in the slightest bit harmed by the QANTAS joint business (as opposed to, for example, the now-DOA Delta-Aeromexico alliance where many Delta employees' jobs actually are tied up in capacity flown to markets covered by the scope of the agreement).
In any event, all of this entirely-typical ridiculousness is academic. The reality is that Richard Anderson is a smart guy, and he knows full well that the requisite regulatory regime, let alone appropriate economic and geopolitical conditions, to facilitate a joint “hub” at PVG resembling that which Delta has at AMS with KLM today is highly unlikely to be in place anytime soon. Just as he knew that Delta has precisely zero chance of actually moving its Tokyo hub to HND back when he floated that equally-implausible "idea," and just how he knew that CVG and MEM had little realistic prospect of a future as hubs for a merged airline when he strategically used that line in front of hostile congressman. He’s a business man, and he knows how to play to his audience – this was nothing more, and nothing less.
