Originally Posted by
GUWonder
Most of the cheapest US-Europe economy class tickets I've seen this year booked for same-week travel and for next quarter travel have been from California to Northern Europe; comparably-timed NY/Boston/Washington to Europe tickets have been more expensive than the West Coast-Europe tickets.
Intra-Europe flights aren't all that cheap, but having more than just 4-6 legacy carriers in the competitive picture make for a different market outcome than in the US. Consider the profit picture of the stock market-listed major airlines and it becomes clearer that the competitive landscape conditions aren't all that comparable for intra-continental travel.
Intra-Europe rail doesn't do much of anything to lower international, intra-Europe airline ticket pricing even on short haul trips. With some market exceptions.
Only competition makes the fares lower. On routes where there's an oligopoly there are high prices. On routes with competition, it's cheap. Just look at the NY to LA and SF markets right now. Super cheap because 5 airlines fly those routes. I have seen it in TLV as well - on routes with only two (national) carriers, fares are insane. On competitive routes, prices are more reasonable. Even on intra-Europe it's super cheap where there are LCCs - I flew Cologne to Dublin on Ryanair for less than the cost of the taxi from Dublin airport to my hotel. Where it's just the national carriers vs. each other it's expensive.