>As someone paraphrased, a car without breaks and steering wheel works just fine until you hit the first bend.
On the other hand, a car without a second and third steering wheel, 20 windscreen wipers, and an oven in the back, keeps running just fine, even after the first bend...
Have you also taken into consideration the death rate in smaller planes, much higher than commercial craft. The moment you attempt that with a 'high capacity' craft you'll suddenly find yourself regulated out of existence by a book written in blood.
I'm not saying they're bloat. They're a tradeoff between cost (man hours of work) and lives. They've increased the cost of small planes tenfold but have saved tens of thousands of lives.
1) HR 2) Legal 3) Sales 4) Marketing 5) Payroll 6) Admin staff 7) Most of Engineering, other than the bare minimum of L1/L2/3 support.
As someone paraphrased, a car without breaks and steering wheel works just fine until you hit the first bend.