Or to put it another way, more people fly more often. People don't stay in a job for life anymore, loyalty to one's employer is not what it was and the attitude to customers and staff has changed right across the economy.
It's not BA's fault, everyone's at it. Few companies could find the right people for the right wage in the UK talent pool to fill the jobs with the discretion required. There's too many flights, hence rules and procedures to maintain operations that impact upon discretion. It also removed the ability of staff to muck about with revenue.
In the UK we don't have a single airport that was built from scratch with the 21st century long haul / short haul / legacy / loco mix in mind. Next week I fly through T3 LHR built for the 707 and DC8, one can't help but notice it now looks like the Trafford Centre with an immigration centre attached. I think the problem runs WAY deeper than BA.
Indeed if they brought back all the little touches that were great back in the day, I'd be paying a comparable price that used to leave me skint for a month after booking. In short, they'd go bust remarkably quickly, BASSA notwithstanding.