Originally Posted by
Superjeff
No direct subsidies after the early 1960's, but with regulation, the airlines cross subsidized some of the shorter, local service type routes with revenues from the more profitable ones. Basically, the only major "hubs" as we know them today were Delta's in Atlanta (and, to a lesser extent, Eastern's, and Braniff in Dallas. Yes, there were other opportunities to connect enroute, but most of the time you ended up interlining. I think an argument can be made that if you compare apples to apples (in those days all fares were fully refundable), after adjusting for inflation, the fares were higher, but not that much higher as I hear people ..... about today.
1. By the 1980's, there were numerous hubs. I flew through TWA's St. Louis operation in 1983. It was huge and had flights going lots of places. United had a big operation in Chicago.
2. Non-refundability started showing up in the mid-80's, but this isn't some gigantic issue. Remember, air tickets were quite expensive as compared to people's disposible incomes. They got less refundable as they got cheaper, and even now higher priced tickets are more flexible.
3. Fares are ridiculously lower now. A $400 or $500 roundtrip cross country fare was extremely common in the early 1980's. That's what LEISURE travelers paid with a 21 day advance purchase and a Saturday stay. That's $1200 now. A family of 4 going from the West Coast to Disney World might have paid $4800 in today's dollars just on airfare. This was out of reach of a lot of people.
I grew up in reasonably affluent suburb of Los Angeles. MANY of my high school classmates, and their families, literally never flew anywhere.
Don't let anyone tell you that airfares weren't much, much more expensive back then.