Jetstar has, by itself, as a direct result of QF policy, actually shrunk the Japanese market!! Wow...that is a big call. Sure the Board will be calling you anyday for your rare forensic insights into the lemming like behaviour of management who for some reason seem to seek loss rather than profit. Are you really sure Japan wasn't being subsidized by mainline losses before and now is closer to the long run trend which from all accounts I read is downwards anyway.
Subsidies are such interesting things. For example the severe constraints on Sydney due the size of the airport and the curfew is a heavy subsidy by travellers toward those carriers with privileged positions at KSA. One in particular. Imagine the free market value of the acres of staff car parks at the Qantas base? Wow....If Sydney West airport had even one 12,000 ft Cat 3 strip up and running now, 24/7 with open skies access, yields would have fallen and markets expanded. So the monopolist carrier would have have to slim down heaps. In that world the $150 k Second Officers would be long gone. What is the "free market" value of a Qantas S/O job if they had to pay the full costs and not be subsidized by the rest of the Group (including one wonders.... JQ's blue singlet Y class travellers?) I'd guess that buying your own 744 rating and starting at $65k would be the going rate if you advertised 200 jobs tomorrow and saw what the market would bear.
The mere fact that Qantas mainline operates such an inefficient fleet with way above world level salaries for pilots is a function of hidden subsidies of all sorts. It would be fascinating to sort it all out. Years back, (and if anyone wants it I think there's a copy in Genex's library) the old BTE produced a report saying that Qantas' costs and protection were such a net drain on Australian industry and tourism that we would all be better off to scrap QF, announce open skies and let the free market rule. Jetstar is a start at reversing that travesty and if pampered/subisized AIPA/Qantas pilots could think a little positively and read history books instead of sledging, the world might be a better place.