Hand Solo:
I have been thinking about your figures during the course of the day. Laker crew costs were bound to be high when viewed as a proportion of the whole budget. We had some 275 pilots and over 100 F/Es but the entire workforce was only around 2500. Therefore, the aircrew represented 15% of the entire workforce.
At that time, BA had around 58000 employees so if we were to apply the same 15% to that then we would arrive at some 8700 aircrew. Did BA actually have that many? I rather doubt it for what you had (still have) is too many managers and hangers-on.
In any event (believe me) I am not trying to prove that one organisation is more effficient than the other. As you well know, every time management wants to have a money saving exercise the first place they attack is flight operations. What I was hoping to get was some ammunition that we could throw at the bean counters next time we have to fight our corners or look for a pay rise.
I have never believed that flight crews do not do their best to be efficient and I think it is high time that the bean counters looked elsewhere when they're looking for economies. Therefore, some facts and figures would be useful.