Am I wrong that there is just no action for the PF to perform wrt the throttle levers in a conventionally designed aircraft?
pj
You seem intent on believing what you want to believe regardless of the facts.
On *most* conventionally designed aircraft you have to pull the thrust levers to idle when you flare, there is no such thing as autothrust in a very large percentage of airplanes. That's the way it's worked on the B727 and every other non-FBW aircraft I've ever flown. Even on most conventional aircraft with autothrust, such as the B757, this is usually disconnected at the time the pilot disconnects the autopilot leaving the thrust levers under manual control. If you don't pull them back yourself when you land they produce whatever thrust the lever demands. This was never pointed out to me in training as a design flaw.
The difference you seem to be getting at is between the Airbus and certain recent Boeings which are landed manually with autothrust active. The Boeing TLs move whereas the Airbus ones do not. There are arguements for either system when looked at holistically, but the Airbus system is not one iota more complicated or different in philosophy in this particular respect than a B757, B727 or a DC-3 for that matter. You want idle thrust, pull the levers to idle. Simple.
ELAC