You could be right in the end, as you said time will tell. Hard to say especially since one would have to compare the higher wage costs over years (!) with "lost opportunities". If it was my airline I would have let go the entire 777 fleet and half the Airbus fleet on unpaid leave indefinitely about 1,5 years ago. I would not have paid inactive based guys for years. I also would have stopped housing Jan 2021. Training department is way to powerful in Cathay, chop all the nonsense evaluation command sims or however they are called. Replace it with a cup of tea with the Chief pilot and a 5 minute review of your training record. Cut the stupid output of cringe-worthy safety and training videos and cut the yearly new decision make tool rubbish etc etc. These guys produce work in order to be important, I would cut the third floor by half or better outsource the whole thing to CAE.
I personally do not think it is feasible nor smart to run an airline on a massive over-capacity, possibly for years, given that China's Covid-exit policy and consumer behaviour is totally unknown. Once clear you re-recruit and pay whatever is needed.
Willie Walsh's opinion on that matter I found quite amusing:
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...day-chaos.html
My only direct critique of your position would be that your perspective appears to me rather self-centric. Just because we and our circle of friends don't find COS18 attractive enough doesn't mean it is not attractive in general. Not many from SA have left, and basically zero locals, as an example.