Well spoke... Let's not only look at the income statement, but also at the balance sheet. The current thinking is that there exists enough monitoring capacity to place a value on the "intangible" elements that make up a company's assets. While the obvious ones are already accounted for (the brand name of Coke, for example), there are the ones that a bit harder to measure, but still a part of the overall "value" of the company.
To extend the thinking from the previous post, what if we were to put an arbitrary asset value on the per-pilot (per-F/A, per Gnd Eng., per Admin staff...) morale factor? (say 10-20,000 US$ per) I would like to think that over the course of a year each one of us influences the cost and quality of the portion of the "product" we are responsible for. I would then like to put forth that in the irrational exuberance of the poorly implemented cost cutting over the last 7 years or so, there has actually been a large DECREASE in net shareholder value. And yet again "we" are the accountants enemy...the scourge of the shareholders. That's only because they choose to measure costs. What of all the p***ed off passengers that bear the brunt of the decrease in morale? Forever lost to us, they're not likely to fill in survey forms,but vote with their feet to SQ,UA etc.
So to recap, a 12,000 employee company had (low ball) about a 120,000,000 US$ asset in their employee base. The last few mgmts. have turned that wonderfull, precious and unique team into a liability!
They don't trumpet that in the annual report do they?