Don't like the seniority system? Go fly corporate.
Before long you'll wish you were back in the seniority system.
Pilots are unique in that they have to be perfect. Every landing must be successful or you are out of a job, or dead.
There are rewards of a sort for above-average pilots, though. You can bid bigger planes or fly international instead of camping out on the narrow-body. You can get into training or standards. You can get into management. But the line pilots' skills need to be so similar one to the other that merit is meaningless.
And as an aside, I'd take the sixties over the naughties any day......