> I suppose that makes me an outlier, but the ~$25 is worth taking all the stress out of queueing at the gate and trying to get on as quickly as possible. Your time/value equation might be different.

I think the math just starts changing when you're not traveling by yourself. If it's even a small family of 3, traveling with checked luggage is suddenly $150 roundtrip. Sure, largely insignificant compared to the cost of the tickets themselves, but still enough to make you think twice about it.