I wonder how much of the increased schedule times are due to baggage fees? Here is my theory:
In 2008, airlines began charging for checked bags[1]. This was done both for the immediate revenue increase, and also to prod flyers into airline loyalty programs or airline credit cards to get a free checked bag. However, that caused a lot of casual fliers to go carryon-only. That, in turn, causes it to take longer to board/exit planes, leading to longer turn around times.
I've long contended that airlines should get rid of checked bag fees. And if they feel like they really want to be evil, switch the fees to carryons. That would decrease the number of carryons and decrease the turnaround time.
EDIT: From the article "Starting around 2008, Scheduled flight times began increasing even faster than actual ones"
This has me convinced that the bag fees really torpedoed turnaround times.
I'm a _somewhat_ frequent flyer (5-8 trips a year). I've never experienced a plane being delayed by the time it take passengers to enter/exit the plane. I have, however, experienced delays because the baggage handlers are still loading the plane.
For that reason, I've never understood the obsession with loading the plane quickly.
If they’re not done loading the plane, they don’t have to make an announcement about it because it’s self evident, whereas if everyone is sitting down and ready to go, they will let everyone know what the holdup is.
Just yesterday I took a flight where they asked everyone to try to hurry up loading so they could get the plane off the ground sooner.
I've also been on flights where they asked us to hurry, and then we (flight attendants included) sat and waited for other things to be completed. Not saying that was what you experienced, of course! Nor am I complaining. My understanding is that gate attendants get penalized if they're the reason the plane is held up, so I understand why they'd play it safe and hurry people.
I'd love to see some hard data on this (I've tried to find it in the past, but there's so much fluff about this subject)!
I agree 100% and when I encounter people that don't believe this theory I point out that, once upon a time, Southwest Airlines used to be able to turn an entire 737 in 10 minutes.
I agree, but it's worth noting that those 10 minute turns were probably -100 or -200 series aircraft with a capacity of about 100 passengers, while a modern Max-8/9/10 aircraft holds about 200 (who still board through a single door).
How would they charge for carryons though? Would they charge for say a bag of food you just bought? Also they'd have to put in infrastructure for charging right at the gate, and I'd imagine that would further slow things down, require more staff etc. Just don't think either thing will happen, since clearly they care a lot more about making money than passenger convenience.
Ryanair already does this in the UK and Frontier does it in the US, so clearly someone has figured out the logistics of it. Both are ultra-low cost carriers (in the same model as Southwest used to be).
As for payments slowing down boarding: I expect that it does, but the price info I see online suggests that the carryon fees are punitive (more than checked baggage, and with a 100% surcharge for paying at the gate). In other words, the purpose of the fee is more about discouraging people from bringing a carryon in the first place than the revenue it generates.
Frontier doesn't seem to be shy about reminding customers about the gate pay surcharge, either.
United already charges for carryons (the basic-economy fare only includes items small enough to fit under the seat), and if you bring one they charge you more than the checked bag fee to gate-check it.
Maybe in aggregate flights have fewer delays but every single flight I’ve taken this year has been delayed (on top of the padded flight times the article mentions). I’ve flown about half a dozen trips.
I also hate the argument that the free market should solve the pricing problem. Airlines have exclusivity on airport gates. Any frequent flier on the SFO -> EWR route knows that if you want to save money you can book an Alaska flight instead of United but Alaska has significantly fewer gates and usually gets delayed when arriving waiting for one. Flights aren’t exactly equal commodities and even if the airlines were well-run, contracts for these gates are locked in.
Pricing stats here also fail to account for business class vs economy pricing. Business class prices on tickets have skyrocketed, way outstripping purported CPI. In some cases prices have doubled or more since COVID.
> Pricing stats here also fail to account for business class vs economy pricing. Business class prices on tickets have skyrocketed, way outstripping purported CPI. In some cases prices have doubled or more since COVID.
Sure, but business class is still 100% full (and frequent fliers complain that they aren't getting upgrades, so it seems to be mostly paid).
This is like when companies complain that they can't find any good devs, but don't want to pay market rate.
Perhaps the free market is solving the pricing/timeliness problem, but your fellow travelers value lower prices more than being on time?
> Business class prices on
> tickets have skyrocketed
The people with more disposable income who are subsidizing air travel for the rest of us are giving us an even larger subsidy these days? I feel just terrible about that.
It’s not that simple. Business is representing an ever increasing % of travellers, so airlines are increasing the % of business class seating, leaving fewer seats for economy seating and therefore less availability in economy, so you might not even end up seeing the savings in your flight ticket since more economy passengers are competing with each other.
Business class tickets are bought by companies not people. You pay for that "subsidy" through more expensive products to pay for that exec's stupid flight to a symposium where they all talk about how great they are and how important their ideas are.
Every time I've flown First/Business class, it's been out of my own pocket. Every time I've had my employer pay for a flight, it's been in cattle class.
Now I'm wondering what percentage of people in First/Business class are paying for the flight themselves.
Domestic at least, I expect a lot is upgrades for status travelers (who have flown a lot of it on company expense accounts). At least that's my experience.
In semi-retirement, I probably do need to burn down my points though.
I think the average flyer can be pretty confident that they're saving more on the flight than the incremental addition to their grocery bills attributable to company executives' flight costs...
> I also hate the argument that the free market should solve the pricing problem.
It's odd that in his rush to point the finger at the government monopoly, he seems to have missed that a free market where customers select flights mostly on price naturally tends towards airlines operating lower cruise speeds for better operating economy, and not allowing loads of wiggle room in their schedules to make up for delays.
The idea that actually the real reason why aircraft are operating more slowly and delayed more is because there aren't enough ATCs in position doesn't pass the sniff test at all for anyone that knows the slightest thing about commercial aviation
Lower speeds to save on fuel as closing on sound barrier has somewhat sharp increase in air resistance.
Also I think in general increasing utilization of aeroplanes increases revenues and thus makes things more profitable as money is not made while not flying. Easiest way to achieve this is to remove slack like shortening turnover times. Which then results in cascading delays as planes simply are not available at times.
Why does Alaska schedule more flights than they have gate slots? Or is it just that anything that delays gate availability is going to impact them first?
Budget airlines is Europe have figured out an evil approach to avoiding delays.
Airlines are eligible to pay compensation for delays longer than two hours. So they start boarding the aircraft 1.5 hrs after departure, close the doors at the 2 hour mark and then spend the next hours sitting on the tarmac while depriving the passengers of food and drink.
This strategy would save them having to issue food vouchers at the airport, but not delay compensation per se which is based on arrival time at the destination gate.
I will say I've been on a number of flights that left late but arrived early/on-time. I think they build a pad into flight time and/or give up fuel efficiency to make up time.
There was an article posted to HN recently (today, even!) that showed how airlines do pad their flight times deliberately.
I think it's reasonable. Even if you depart the gate on time, there could be things out of the airliners' control that cause delays, such as a long queue to take off.
1. the airfare inflation chart is based on the Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI which is calculated differently from the other metrics in the article; it does take into account routes popularity.
2. today’s average Economy ticket is different from the 1990s ticket: meals, seat pitch, seat selection, baggage. service changed to the point that 1990 Standard Economy is more similar to 2025 Premium Economy.
Not captured in numbers or the article, but I've noticed service becoming a lot poorer, though perhaps the downward trend has stopped for now. Between 2021-2024 or so, I encountered a lot of people working for airlines (gate agents, flight attendants, etc.) who really went out of their way to make me feel like they're doing me a favor by letting me fly on their plane.
That's not to say that the average airline worker is like that; it just seemed like the bottom fell out, so that the floor on what my worst experience could be while flying became substantially worse compared to times before.
In my experience, there has been a wide-spread (across the retail and service economy) decline in how customer service personnel treat customers, and it seems like it might actually be deeper than that (extending throughout young people's attitudes towards their jobs).
Quite right, I'm sure. But the part that I'm more interested about is why it feels like the floor got so much lower? I don't know that the average interaction in public (in any context, not just flying) is any or substantially worse, but it seems like the variation to the downside got more extreme.
> In my experience, there has been a wide-spread (across the retail and service economy) decline in how customer service personnel treat customers
This hasn't been my experience at all. And to be quite frank, whenever I see someone claim this, my cynical misanthropic brain assumes that's what's ACTUALLY happening is that customers are asking for exceptions beyond policy that customer service personnel can't give them and then claim they're getting poor service or that the customer service rep was rude for telling them "no" on something.
I worked retail and fast food for over 10 years. People suck. And while I got out of that industry 13 years ago, I know that people have only gotten worse. People demand the world and then complain about poor service when they don't get it.
Young people feel (either really or they have been convinced) that employers don't care about them, pay them slave wages, and will generally abuse them so they feel the same way in return -- no loyalty, no care other than getting the next paycheck.
Flying before every country dropped covid restrictions was really just a degree of bliss that I'll never again attain in my life. Tickets at rock bottom prices, booking just one seat but having a full row to stretch out and sleep on, nobody in front of or behind me, meals being oddly good for some reason (maybe desperate to appeal to customers or not needing to make as many meals with little ingredients?). 2020-2023 was peak travel.
Economic inefficiency can feel really good. Personally experiencing tens of billions of dollars of capital investment designed for a capacity 50x as high, temporarily priced way below what it should be due to a market shock? Sign me up!
I’ll never forget going on a business trip where the restrictions were in place on the way there and had dropped by the time of my return flight.
I was so mad.
I flew probably 30 times during covid restrictions, and as you say, it was absolute bliss. That return flight reminded me why flying was miserable before COVID restrictions and is miserable now.
Less than half-full planes were very frequent prior to the big airline mergers in the 2010's. The loss of US Air, Contentintal, and Air Tran has completely ruined air travel. On most domestic flights, the middle seat was for children or unoccupied.
Airfare alone isn’t a great indicator of price, since airlines have been reducing benefits—luggage generally is an upcharge now, whereas it used to be built into the ticket price.
They are very guilty of shrinkflation in general. For example, first class used to get you access to the airport lounges. Now you need a very expensive subscription of some sort to get access.
Lounges have gotten significantly worse since Covid though with overcrowding issues (with some exceptions like KIX), so I don’t think it’s a particularly great loss. My card lets me pay some token amount to gain access to lounges but I’d rather spend that money to get an actual meal cooked for me rather than a buffet and then sit in a quiet corner of the terminal than a crowded lounge.
This varies: a family member of mine flew cross-country a few weeks ago first class (on the company's dime) and was given automatic access to the lounges there.
International first class / business class travel is a different category than domestic. I was just referring to domestic. It usually costs an order of magnitude more so there are still some decent perks associated with it.
Transcontinental flights often qualify when shorter ones would not. If your flight has lay-flat seats (I usually fly Delta, so think Delta One), your ticket for one of those will usually cover the lounges. Whereas a standard domestic first-class ticket does not.
A 45L backpack ("personal item") and a 50L duffle bag (carry-on) give you a huge amount of space sufficient for pretty much any travels on the cheapest ticket.
Every flight I've been on this year, except one, has demanded people check bags at the gate before Group 1 even finishes boarding.
Although, this seems to apply only to hardshell wheeled cases - I walked aboard with my backpack & shoulder bag without any issues, and fit my backpack into an overhead compartment and shoulder bag under my seat with no problems.
But next time, I may try to pack everything into a single backpack, and re-configure things once I'm in my seat so I have easy access to a smaller subset of stuff in my shoulderbag instead.
> Every flight I've been on this year, except one, has demanded people check bags at the gate before Group 1 even finishes boarding.
I don't think this is that unreasonable. Gate staff can look around and count how many bags people have, and they know how much space is in the overhead bins. Not to mention that nearly every flight will run out of overhead space, so they might as well start demanding people check bags sooner rather than later.
Though the overhead bin space probably wouldn't be as bad if airlines were better about enforcing size limits. So often, a roller bag is just an inch or two too tall, so has to be placed lengthwise in the overhead bin, making it take up space that could have fit 2-3 bags.
If I see that happening and I'm traveling light enough, I've merged my backpack into my duffle bag so that I have one single "personal item" for under the seat in front of me. Nobody ever seems to care that it doesn't cleanly fit.
But jeez, forcing check-ins during Group 1 is worse than I've ever seen it. I guess it's more and more popular to use two hard-shell carry-ons and put them into the overhead compartment. And I guess the airline just sees it as an incentive for you to buy a more expensive seat.
This is a good move anyway, as the overhead bins fill rapidly but you can always count on your under-seat space. And if you do find space overhead, you have a bit more room to stretch your legs with nothing filling in that space.
I do this all the time on Alaska. I have the same Peak Design travel backpack as a sibling comment mentioned, plus an ordinary overhead roller suitcase. Maybe one in five times I have to gate-check the suitcase, but the rest of the time I have ~90L of space carried on and off the plane.
How is it inconsiderate? The suitcase goes in the overhead where I'm taking up no more space than any other passenger, the backpack fits under the seat in front of me. It squashes my legs a bit, but the only person getting inconvenienced there is myself.
I usually travel with my wife & 3 kids, and ... yeah, none of those things will work. I might still be able to fit my youngest in that backpack, I don't think she could wear one (She might be a bit too big now).
The airline charges everyone else $50 per bag, $50 for selecting your seat, gives you $10 off for traveling with a backpack in a middle seat, and pockets $90 after costs. I'm glad you feel lucky about that.
There's even gems like "no carry ons" and "no airline miles" tickets now. They cost the same as the lowest fares last year.
> The airline charges everyone else $50 per bag, $50 for selecting your seat, gives you $10 off for traveling with a backpack in a middle seat, and pockets $90 after costs
And at the end of the day, operates at a pre-tax[1] profit margin of 5% (in a good year), or 0% in a bad one.
If all airlines became altruistic non-profit entities tomorrow that only exist to serve their customers and nobody else, your ticket prices wouldn't drop more than ~$10-20.
[1] Post-tax, it's at 2.5%, but I'm not qualified to get into whether or not there's Hollywood accounting going on.
Go read the union agreement between united american airlines pilots and united airlines if you want something infuriating.
We could have much lower prices and operating under the same federal safety guidelines, but rich ass pilots are exploiting collective bargaining to keep their salaries unbelievably high when they don't need to be.
My air fares in Europe ha stayed shockingly stable. My home base is in Vienna and my trips have stayed stable. Which is impressive if you consider inflation and energy prices.
We have no idea how much that CO2 will cost to remove since we don't have the technology, and that is assuming that we need to remove it, so I don't understand why you think that is "way too cheap"?
I wonder how much of the increased schedule times are due to baggage fees? Here is my theory:
In 2008, airlines began charging for checked bags[1]. This was done both for the immediate revenue increase, and also to prod flyers into airline loyalty programs or airline credit cards to get a free checked bag. However, that caused a lot of casual fliers to go carryon-only. That, in turn, causes it to take longer to board/exit planes, leading to longer turn around times.
I've long contended that airlines should get rid of checked bag fees. And if they feel like they really want to be evil, switch the fees to carryons. That would decrease the number of carryons and decrease the turnaround time.
EDIT: From the article "Starting around 2008, Scheduled flight times began increasing even faster than actual ones" This has me convinced that the bag fees really torpedoed turnaround times.
[1] https://www.farecompare.com/travel-advice/airline-fees-bags-...
I'm a _somewhat_ frequent flyer (5-8 trips a year). I've never experienced a plane being delayed by the time it take passengers to enter/exit the plane. I have, however, experienced delays because the baggage handlers are still loading the plane.
For that reason, I've never understood the obsession with loading the plane quickly.
If they’re not done loading the plane, they don’t have to make an announcement about it because it’s self evident, whereas if everyone is sitting down and ready to go, they will let everyone know what the holdup is.
Just yesterday I took a flight where they asked everyone to try to hurry up loading so they could get the plane off the ground sooner.
I've also been on flights where they asked us to hurry, and then we (flight attendants included) sat and waited for other things to be completed. Not saying that was what you experienced, of course! Nor am I complaining. My understanding is that gate attendants get penalized if they're the reason the plane is held up, so I understand why they'd play it safe and hurry people.
I'd love to see some hard data on this (I've tried to find it in the past, but there's so much fluff about this subject)!
I agree 100% and when I encounter people that don't believe this theory I point out that, once upon a time, Southwest Airlines used to be able to turn an entire 737 in 10 minutes.
https://southwest50.com/our-stories/a-turning-point-the-birt...
I agree, but it's worth noting that those 10 minute turns were probably -100 or -200 series aircraft with a capacity of about 100 passengers, while a modern Max-8/9/10 aircraft holds about 200 (who still board through a single door).
Still, 20 minute turns would be industry-leading.
How would they charge for carryons though? Would they charge for say a bag of food you just bought? Also they'd have to put in infrastructure for charging right at the gate, and I'd imagine that would further slow things down, require more staff etc. Just don't think either thing will happen, since clearly they care a lot more about making money than passenger convenience.
Ryanair already does this in the UK and Frontier does it in the US, so clearly someone has figured out the logistics of it. Both are ultra-low cost carriers (in the same model as Southwest used to be).
As for payments slowing down boarding: I expect that it does, but the price info I see online suggests that the carryon fees are punitive (more than checked baggage, and with a 100% surcharge for paying at the gate). In other words, the purpose of the fee is more about discouraging people from bringing a carryon in the first place than the revenue it generates.
Frontier doesn't seem to be shy about reminding customers about the gate pay surcharge, either.
Sometimes there isn’t even enough space in the cabin for all carry-ons, so you have to leave yours with a baggage handler in front of the plane.
Very often.
United already charges for carryons (the basic-economy fare only includes items small enough to fit under the seat), and if you bring one they charge you more than the checked bag fee to gate-check it.
In May, Newark airport flights were on time 49% of the time: https://www.transtats.bts.gov/ot_delay/OT_DelayCause1.asp?20...
Maybe in aggregate flights have fewer delays but every single flight I’ve taken this year has been delayed (on top of the padded flight times the article mentions). I’ve flown about half a dozen trips.
I also hate the argument that the free market should solve the pricing problem. Airlines have exclusivity on airport gates. Any frequent flier on the SFO -> EWR route knows that if you want to save money you can book an Alaska flight instead of United but Alaska has significantly fewer gates and usually gets delayed when arriving waiting for one. Flights aren’t exactly equal commodities and even if the airlines were well-run, contracts for these gates are locked in.
Pricing stats here also fail to account for business class vs economy pricing. Business class prices on tickets have skyrocketed, way outstripping purported CPI. In some cases prices have doubled or more since COVID.
> Pricing stats here also fail to account for business class vs economy pricing. Business class prices on tickets have skyrocketed, way outstripping purported CPI. In some cases prices have doubled or more since COVID.
Sure, but business class is still 100% full (and frequent fliers complain that they aren't getting upgrades, so it seems to be mostly paid).
This is like when companies complain that they can't find any good devs, but don't want to pay market rate.
Perhaps the free market is solving the pricing/timeliness problem, but your fellow travelers value lower prices more than being on time?
The people with more disposable income who are subsidizing air travel for the rest of us are giving us an even larger subsidy these days? I feel just terrible about that.It’s not that simple. Business is representing an ever increasing % of travellers, so airlines are increasing the % of business class seating, leaving fewer seats for economy seating and therefore less availability in economy, so you might not even end up seeing the savings in your flight ticket since more economy passengers are competing with each other.
>The people with more disposable income
Business class tickets are bought by companies not people. You pay for that "subsidy" through more expensive products to pay for that exec's stupid flight to a symposium where they all talk about how great they are and how important their ideas are.
Every time I've flown First/Business class, it's been out of my own pocket. Every time I've had my employer pay for a flight, it's been in cattle class.
Now I'm wondering what percentage of people in First/Business class are paying for the flight themselves.
My current employer lets me expense flights so that I book in First and they pay what it would have cost in cattle. Might be worth it?
Otoh, I have minor elite status and have gotten upgraded to cattle plus the last couple flights which might be nice enough.
Domestic at least, I expect a lot is upgrades for status travelers (who have flown a lot of it on company expense accounts). At least that's my experience.
In semi-retirement, I probably do need to burn down my points though.
I think the average flyer can be pretty confident that they're saving more on the flight than the incremental addition to their grocery bills attributable to company executives' flight costs...
[dead]
> I also hate the argument that the free market should solve the pricing problem.
It's odd that in his rush to point the finger at the government monopoly, he seems to have missed that a free market where customers select flights mostly on price naturally tends towards airlines operating lower cruise speeds for better operating economy, and not allowing loads of wiggle room in their schedules to make up for delays.
The idea that actually the real reason why aircraft are operating more slowly and delayed more is because there aren't enough ATCs in position doesn't pass the sniff test at all for anyone that knows the slightest thing about commercial aviation
Lower speeds to save on fuel as closing on sound barrier has somewhat sharp increase in air resistance.
Also I think in general increasing utilization of aeroplanes increases revenues and thus makes things more profitable as money is not made while not flying. Easiest way to achieve this is to remove slack like shortening turnover times. Which then results in cascading delays as planes simply are not available at times.
Why does Alaska schedule more flights than they have gate slots? Or is it just that anything that delays gate availability is going to impact them first?
Why cherrypick May?
may is the latest data currently available.
> Business class prices on tickets have skyrocketed, way outstripping purported CPI.
Because business class is a luxury?
Budget airlines is Europe have figured out an evil approach to avoiding delays. Airlines are eligible to pay compensation for delays longer than two hours. So they start boarding the aircraft 1.5 hrs after departure, close the doors at the 2 hour mark and then spend the next hours sitting on the tarmac while depriving the passengers of food and drink.
This strategy would save them having to issue food vouchers at the airport, but not delay compensation per se which is based on arrival time at the destination gate.
Seems simple enough to stop that - start requiring compensation to be paid based on takeoff time.
Shouldn’t it be based on arrival time?
I will say I've been on a number of flights that left late but arrived early/on-time. I think they build a pad into flight time and/or give up fuel efficiency to make up time.
There was an article posted to HN recently (today, even!) that showed how airlines do pad their flight times deliberately.
I think it's reasonable. Even if you depart the gate on time, there could be things out of the airliners' control that cause delays, such as a long queue to take off.
Great analysis! a couple of comments:
1. the airfare inflation chart is based on the Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI which is calculated differently from the other metrics in the article; it does take into account routes popularity.
2. today’s average Economy ticket is different from the 1990s ticket: meals, seat pitch, seat selection, baggage. service changed to the point that 1990 Standard Economy is more similar to 2025 Premium Economy.
I am really curious about the sinusoidal delay graph. It seems like average flight times rise and fall once a year.
Is it summer travel then holiday travel then a winter spring slump? That would support the author's hypothesis that congestion is to blame.
Not captured in numbers or the article, but I've noticed service becoming a lot poorer, though perhaps the downward trend has stopped for now. Between 2021-2024 or so, I encountered a lot of people working for airlines (gate agents, flight attendants, etc.) who really went out of their way to make me feel like they're doing me a favor by letting me fly on their plane.
That's not to say that the average airline worker is like that; it just seemed like the bottom fell out, so that the floor on what my worst experience could be while flying became substantially worse compared to times before.
In my experience, there has been a wide-spread (across the retail and service economy) decline in how customer service personnel treat customers, and it seems like it might actually be deeper than that (extending throughout young people's attitudes towards their jobs).
In my experience, there has been a widespread decline in how customers treat service personnel.
There is just a widespread kindness gap in our society.
Quite right, I'm sure. But the part that I'm more interested about is why it feels like the floor got so much lower? I don't know that the average interaction in public (in any context, not just flying) is any or substantially worse, but it seems like the variation to the downside got more extreme.
> In my experience, there has been a wide-spread (across the retail and service economy) decline in how customer service personnel treat customers
This hasn't been my experience at all. And to be quite frank, whenever I see someone claim this, my cynical misanthropic brain assumes that's what's ACTUALLY happening is that customers are asking for exceptions beyond policy that customer service personnel can't give them and then claim they're getting poor service or that the customer service rep was rude for telling them "no" on something.
I worked retail and fast food for over 10 years. People suck. And while I got out of that industry 13 years ago, I know that people have only gotten worse. People demand the world and then complain about poor service when they don't get it.
Young people feel (either really or they have been convinced) that employers don't care about them, pay them slave wages, and will generally abuse them so they feel the same way in return -- no loyalty, no care other than getting the next paycheck.
Flying before every country dropped covid restrictions was really just a degree of bliss that I'll never again attain in my life. Tickets at rock bottom prices, booking just one seat but having a full row to stretch out and sleep on, nobody in front of or behind me, meals being oddly good for some reason (maybe desperate to appeal to customers or not needing to make as many meals with little ingredients?). 2020-2023 was peak travel.
Economic inefficiency can feel really good. Personally experiencing tens of billions of dollars of capital investment designed for a capacity 50x as high, temporarily priced way below what it should be due to a market shock? Sign me up!
I’ll never forget going on a business trip where the restrictions were in place on the way there and had dropped by the time of my return flight.
I was so mad.
I flew probably 30 times during covid restrictions, and as you say, it was absolute bliss. That return flight reminded me why flying was miserable before COVID restrictions and is miserable now.
Less than half-full planes were very frequent prior to the big airline mergers in the 2010's. The loss of US Air, Contentintal, and Air Tran has completely ruined air travel. On most domestic flights, the middle seat was for children or unoccupied.
At least the comments there are better than the article
Airfare alone isn’t a great indicator of price, since airlines have been reducing benefits—luggage generally is an upcharge now, whereas it used to be built into the ticket price.
They are very guilty of shrinkflation in general. For example, first class used to get you access to the airport lounges. Now you need a very expensive subscription of some sort to get access.
Lounges have gotten significantly worse since Covid though with overcrowding issues (with some exceptions like KIX), so I don’t think it’s a particularly great loss. My card lets me pay some token amount to gain access to lounges but I’d rather spend that money to get an actual meal cooked for me rather than a buffet and then sit in a quiet corner of the terminal than a crowded lounge.
Dragonpass can be relatively cheap if you get it through e.g. a credit card and you fly more than once a month.
This varies: a family member of mine flew cross-country a few weeks ago first class (on the company's dime) and was given automatic access to the lounges there.
International first class / business class travel is a different category than domestic. I was just referring to domestic. It usually costs an order of magnitude more so there are still some decent perks associated with it.
...And I would have hoped that by "cross-country" it could be understood that this flight was, in fact, domestic?
Transcontinental flights often qualify when shorter ones would not. If your flight has lay-flat seats (I usually fly Delta, so think Delta One), your ticket for one of those will usually cover the lounges. Whereas a standard domestic first-class ticket does not.
I'm lucky I'm able to travel with just a backpack.
A 45L backpack ("personal item") and a 50L duffle bag (carry-on) give you a huge amount of space sufficient for pretty much any travels on the cheapest ticket.
It's $300 but the Peak Design backpack is amazing. It has one massive compartment which makes it easy to efficiently cram stuff in there. https://www.peakdesign.com/products/travel-backpack?Size=45L...
Most backpacks seem to compete on maximizing pocket count which isn't good for tetris packing.
Every flight I've been on this year, except one, has demanded people check bags at the gate before Group 1 even finishes boarding.
Although, this seems to apply only to hardshell wheeled cases - I walked aboard with my backpack & shoulder bag without any issues, and fit my backpack into an overhead compartment and shoulder bag under my seat with no problems.
But next time, I may try to pack everything into a single backpack, and re-configure things once I'm in my seat so I have easy access to a smaller subset of stuff in my shoulderbag instead.
> Every flight I've been on this year, except one, has demanded people check bags at the gate before Group 1 even finishes boarding.
I don't think this is that unreasonable. Gate staff can look around and count how many bags people have, and they know how much space is in the overhead bins. Not to mention that nearly every flight will run out of overhead space, so they might as well start demanding people check bags sooner rather than later.
Though the overhead bin space probably wouldn't be as bad if airlines were better about enforcing size limits. So often, a roller bag is just an inch or two too tall, so has to be placed lengthwise in the overhead bin, making it take up space that could have fit 2-3 bags.
Wow, that's annoying.
If I see that happening and I'm traveling light enough, I've merged my backpack into my duffle bag so that I have one single "personal item" for under the seat in front of me. Nobody ever seems to care that it doesn't cleanly fit.
But jeez, forcing check-ins during Group 1 is worse than I've ever seen it. I guess it's more and more popular to use two hard-shell carry-ons and put them into the overhead compartment. And I guess the airline just sees it as an incentive for you to buy a more expensive seat.
This is a good move anyway, as the overhead bins fill rapidly but you can always count on your under-seat space. And if you do find space overhead, you have a bit more room to stretch your legs with nothing filling in that space.
Most people I saw had a hardshell suitcase, and then a softer personal item they could kick under the seat.
I'm not aware of any airline where a 50L + 45L bag together are legally allowed as carry-on + personal item.
e.g. If you max out the allowed dimensions with United you get a 45.08L carry on and a 23.65L personal item.
And most "cheapest tickets" now no longer include a carry on bag, only a personal item.
I do this all the time on Alaska. I have the same Peak Design travel backpack as a sibling comment mentioned, plus an ordinary overhead roller suitcase. Maybe one in five times I have to gate-check the suitcase, but the rest of the time I have ~90L of space carried on and off the plane.
Yeah, I mean, you can probably get away with it much of the time, but it's pretty inconsiderate to other passengers. Tragedy of the commons.
How is it inconsiderate? The suitcase goes in the overhead where I'm taking up no more space than any other passenger, the backpack fits under the seat in front of me. It squashes my legs a bit, but the only person getting inconvenienced there is myself.
FYI CabinZero has essentially the same design philosophy and you can often find their 44l backpack for $50: http://cabinzero.com
I've mine daily for 5-10 years, they're great.
I usually travel with my wife & 3 kids, and ... yeah, none of those things will work. I might still be able to fit my youngest in that backpack, I don't think she could wear one (She might be a bit too big now).
The airline charges everyone else $50 per bag, $50 for selecting your seat, gives you $10 off for traveling with a backpack in a middle seat, and pockets $90 after costs. I'm glad you feel lucky about that.
There's even gems like "no carry ons" and "no airline miles" tickets now. They cost the same as the lowest fares last year.
Huh? If you're traveling with a backpack (personal item) in a middle seat you're not paying the $50 for a carry-on or the $50 to select a seat.
Updated my comment
> The airline charges everyone else $50 per bag, $50 for selecting your seat, gives you $10 off for traveling with a backpack in a middle seat, and pockets $90 after costs
And at the end of the day, operates at a pre-tax[1] profit margin of 5% (in a good year), or 0% in a bad one.
If all airlines became altruistic non-profit entities tomorrow that only exist to serve their customers and nobody else, your ticket prices wouldn't drop more than ~$10-20.
[1] Post-tax, it's at 2.5%, but I'm not qualified to get into whether or not there's Hollywood accounting going on.
As they say, "if you want to be a millionaire, start with a billion dollars and launch a new airline."
Some European companies make you pay for that too and the basic package only comes with a bag (e.g. laptop bag)
Go read the union agreement between united american airlines pilots and united airlines if you want something infuriating.
We could have much lower prices and operating under the same federal safety guidelines, but rich ass pilots are exploiting collective bargaining to keep their salaries unbelievably high when they don't need to be.
private equity combined with regulatory capture
> Is Air Travel Getting Worse? More delays, fewer accidents, and lower prices
Lower prices ? Where ? In EU surely not.
My air fares in Europe ha stayed shockingly stable. My home base is in Vienna and my trips have stayed stable. Which is impressive if you consider inflation and energy prices.
I agree with you. My flights back home cost double now than they did 5 years ago.
Way too cheap. A flight from London to Rome is CAD150. That doesn't even cover the 100kg CO2 that flight emits.
We have no idea how much that CO2 will cost to remove since we don't have the technology, and that is assuming that we need to remove it, so I don't understand why you think that is "way too cheap"?
The current price of 100kg of CO2 credits is about 7 euros.