The people that should be encouraged to check bags are the casual vacationers and infrequent flyers who have irregular sized luggage, try to bring along too much stuff, and place a low value on their time.

More than that, your solution is targeting the wrong problem. People have become trained (either their employer requires it or just because they can) to compare the base prices published on Kayak, Expedia, or similar web compare site. If an airline gave you something, even if it’s just miles, to check a bag, they will certainly have to raise their base prices to make up for the lost baggage fee, and no longer be competitive on the comparison. Passengers compare base fare, and don’t think about the possible additions like bag fees until they check in, when it becomes an annoyance.

Airlines won’t make up for it by turning planes around faster, because there’s only so fast you can get people on and off an airplane. The airlines are simply playing the game that’s in town. You need something that sounds like an advantage to the passenger (waiting 30 minutes or more in the terminal for your bag isn’t) and is revenue neutral, or all the airlines need to do the same thing.

http://www.slate.com/articles/arts_and_l ife/diary/features/2004/_7/entry_1.html

They’re either ***holes or Know Better (pick your H[0]), so they don’t do this.

So AA has to bribe them to do something they could do for free.

If AA really wanted to deal with the “too many carrions” issues, they would make that offer to non-elite passengers. If the FF program works the way my credit card’s program does, the $5 incentive cuts the cost of checking a bag to $20 (or maybe even a couple bucks less, if you plan in advance via the Interwebs).

There would be a noticeable marginal increase in utility to non-elite customers if the offer were made to them, who also may not be so familiar with how AA handles/processes their baggage.

Otoh, bribing the people who already don’t take what they can have for free (1) won’t have the same effect and (2) doesn’t get at the root cause of those travelers not checking baggage.

Congratulations, Felix, you’ve just endorsed a “solution” that doesn’t address the root cause–and will just delay AA figuring out what that is as they try to give away $5 bills to people who already have shown that they don’t want something for nothing.

http://boardingarea.com/blogs/viewfromth ewing/2011/10/16/why-the-tax-code-encour ages-american-airlines-to-award-bonus-mi les-for-checking-bags-in-boston

One key aspect: There are excise fees imposed on ticket prices that are not imposed on baggage fees. So, a $300 ticket and a $25 bag fee costs an airline less than a $325 ticket that includes the right to check a bag.