US Flights are Too Cheap
 

Flying is too cheap. It's turned American flights into cattle-class headache
excursions.
One should not in 2013 be able to fly from LA to NYC and back for $320.
That's the same price it was in 1988--I remember-- that's the first time
I made the trip.
$600 is a reasonable price for a trip across the continent, and back.
Flight attendants are upset and uncooperative, pilots too, airport staff, all underpaid. What do you expect when you pay them peanuts?
Everything else has gone up in price (gas quadrupled) so flights need to as well.
We can't have our cake (ultra cheap fares) and eat it (good service and leg room) too.

US Flights are Too Cheap
 

It would be an interesting exercise to determine the cost per passenger in 1988 compared to today.

While gas prices were far lower, efficiencies in engines are much better today. Airplanes also pack on a more seats today, I think.

The fares today are also put into far more fare buckets, the $340 transcontinental fare is only for a limited number of seats.

Transcon for $320 all-in is not that common nowadays. It is very limited seats per flight. Plus airlines have taken away food, free checked bags, they charge for 'enhanced' seats, BOB snacks, etc. The base ticket isn't their sole revenue on a per-customer basis.

Well, then remove a few carriers from the market (you can even see that happening through mergers), prevent new ones from entering so that ticket prices can rise, and allow airlines to improve service.

How much do you fly? If you are willing to pay a premium, feel free to do so and fly premium service.

But euro flights can be much much cheaper and include food at times

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$320, total cost round trip coast to coast is not at all common any more. It may happen every now and then, but you can't just pick dates and hope to get anything like that.

Not sure everything should be tied to the price of gas, which totally ignores that airlines can fly more people further for the same amount of fuel they did in 1988, but that's another story.

Nor am I at all believing if you paid Flight Attendants, pilots, and airport staff any more money they would suddenly become any different than they are now.

Though I've also not seen many upset and uncooperative flight attendants .

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Yep! The thread title is absolute bunk. While Euro distances tend to be shorter, an apples to apples comparison is still possible. Look at Easyjets LGW-AMM route. It's long enough that it can be usefully compared with a transcon. The "standard fare" on this route converts to approximately $155 each way, inclusive of even the UKs exorbitant taxes. Many more EU flights are in the 2-3 hour range and are routinely found for under$100 per segment inclusive of taxes/fees. Try getting a flight from NYC-MCI for $100.

The airlines are mostly profitable, with billions of that profit coming from things that used to be included in the fare. Checked baggage, meals, seat assignments and my personal favorite; fuel surcharges. To argue that we are paying too little is absurd.

I disagree completely with your statements.

Supply and demand sets the prices.

Prevailing wages are what the market will bear. Any airline employee who feels he/she is underpaid should feel free to seek employment elsewhere. Peanuts? This a tired, worn cliche.

The 1988 airline ticket price you are quoting is most likely fully flexible. Now there are a lot more fare types, from very cheap with strict conditions, to very flexible expensive.

If you compared a fully flexible 1988 ticket for $320, to a fully flexible ticket today for the same route you may find the price in real terms quite similar.

This post made me laugh. You can pay way over $320 to fly from coast to coast.

Or you could pay $120 for a intro to microeconomics book.

You obviously aren't a route captive like some of us are. Normal price for me to get 250 miles from VPS to ATL is around the $200 RT mark. 'Cheap' from VPS to New York City for August is in the $430 RT range.

Because of the teaser rates from Turkish Airlines this spring, you could have flown from Houston to Istanbul for about $100 more than it would have taken for me to get from the Florida Panhandle to Michigan.

I just checked and $480 was what came up for LAX to NYC RT--
still dirt cheap for a flight across a continent and back.
Those cheapie last minute European flights are exactly what I
am talking about: you get what you pay for.
If longer flights averaged about $300 per 1000 miles (RT) I think they could
re-implement luxury. Sorry, just my 2 cents.

Nice rant but how exactly would you change things?

Anyone can complain...

Nice rant but how exactly would you change things?

It wasn't a rant; it was a proposal to increase fares in order to
enhance services related to flying. Wasn't that obvious?

There is already a premium option offering exactly what you want--higher fares, increased amenities.

in the 1970's, pre ff programs, dal-either coast [lax/lga] was ~ $500 rt....maybe a bit lower now, but 40 years of inflation later....

Pay for F or J. Enhanced services and luxury abound.

If only there was a way to pay more, and fly in a premium cabin.. Oh wait, there is. First or Business Class.

Premium only airlines or flights have come and gone, and mostly unprofitable. Two premium only services I know of remain on legacy airlines, and then there is private.

$500 in 1970 would be worth $3000 in 2013 per a calculator using the cpi...

If only there was a way to pay more, and fly in a premium cabin.. Oh wait, there is. First or Business Class.

I suppose what I was getting at was some happy medium
between cattle class and First Class.

Currently, that so called "happy medium", is called Economy Comfort
on Delta... Economy Plus on United...

Personally, I would not call it a happy medium but rather semi-misery
medium.

OK, tell you what.....I'll take the $320 fare and save you the moral agony of buying a ticket at that price.

Why not buy 2 seats if the OP wants to spend more?

Those are some remarkable $320 RT cross country fares you're seeing. I fly SFO>JFK 6+ times a year and my average spend is more like $400-500. If only I could convince my family to celebrate Xmas at a more affordable time!.

Start your own airline and charge twice as much. Good luck staying in business.

More like $12 for one of the best econ books ever written...

https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/eco...19260862?mt=11

Cattle-class headaches are not limited to the USA...plenty of pain involved with Ryanair and other LCCs in the world.

Your argument is that oligopoly will improve service? What industry? Where? When? I'll have a lot better success arguing that oligopoly would increase executive compensation, unionized wages, and (maybe) shareholder returns.

Fares or too low? Must be kidding me. Yeah, and it also costs $1 to take a bus from NYC to DC. With wi-fi.

Be very careful what you wish for. Wages haven't gone up for working people in 35 years. The solution is NOT higher fares for a variety of reasons, and they will be selling the rope to hang themselves with by raising fares too high. As Hayek said, there are two areas that one cannot leave to the competitive principle: transport and the environment.

In 1988, I would never have paid $320 rt for transcon. OP must have not planned his/her trip well. I was paying $198 rt. And at that price, one got a meal and three checked bags. One also had many many more airline to choose from. Today we have so few airlines, poor service, and high prices. Price aside, flights should be full. To have empty seats flying is not only economically inefficient it is environmentally unsound. If prices were to increase, then the number of flyers would decrease, and the airlines would rightly reduce the number of planes in the sky. It would not increase the number of airlines flying and thus would have no impact on service.

Here's the thing. Allow me to speak on behalf of...I don't know...99% of the traveling public. @:-)

I want cheap fares.

And on any mature form of transport - car, bus, plane, train, boat, etc. - I want those costs/fares to decrease in real terms over time as technology improves.

Of course, there are parameters:
- I want it done safely, so I'm willing to pay taxes for the infrastructure, standards, and oversight related to roads, rails, airports, ferry terminals, etc.
- I want it done reliably, so I want the labor market for flight attendants, pilots, mechanics, etc. to function efficiently so that the planes and airports are staffed correctly.
- I want the basic services provided by the airline to work properly. Website, kiosks, baggage service, etc.
- I'm willing to accept the 31" coach seat as the basic product for these economic purposes, but I'm also one who may buy up to something better if it's on offer.

The reality is that the airlines go a lot farther beyond these basics - the most obvious example being FFP's that can be extremely rewarding (starting with seats at the pointy end of the plane where this entire discussion does not apply). But at the end of the day, I will always opt for a low fare over something like more crappy airline food.

I notice that some airlines are starting to what I think the OP is suggesting...looking for modest add-ons in between a basic rock-bottom fare and an F fare. Frontier, American, Southwest...maybe others in the U.S. as well? I know United and Delta will also sell extra seat pitch but it appears to be after you book the original itin, based on availability.

Not sure what exactly the complaint is here. Some romantic revision of what flying in the 1970's was like? :confused: I'm pretty sure Y seats were still Y seats back then. J/F seats weren't nearly as good as they are now. Airfood still sucked, especially with a healthy side of secondhand smoke. Airlines still lost bags. People always complained about airports.

I do wish that more competitors existed in the market, and maybe they would if more of us were willing to pay more per seat for all sorts of added amenities. (By "more of us" I mean "more of you", of course... ;)) But if we hold at three viable worldwide alliances plus a healthy stable of regional non-alliance players, I think we're okay. If we dropped to two alliances, then I'd worry a lot more about the two of them horse-trading their way out of markets leaving too little competition.

Have you ever flown Easyjet? In my experience it's very comparable to most legacy carriers and fairly pleasant. Everyone likes to throw around Ryanair as emblematic of Euro cheap fares but it would be like saying JetBlue/Virgin/etc.. is the same as Spirit in the US.

We are fortunate here in South Florida (Miami area) to get some outstanding rates on flights. I recently did a RT from FLL to DCA for $140. It was even $20 less if I had flown into BWI up the road. Someone typically has a fare from FLL or MIA to the West Coast (LAX, SFO, etc.) for under $300. Virgin and American both had some great cross country rates from here.

Another thing to remember is that FFP have signed up with a lot of partners that bring in hard cash and fill in seats that would have gone empty otherwise.

Let's compare flying to say, a train. But, to be fair, let's compare apples to apples - we are going to restrain our train travel to what type of service we get on board a plane in coach class.

So, first of all, we are going to have to do something about seat size and comfort. Typical Amtrak coach seating is 21.5" wide at 41in pitch. Yeah, that is pretty much domestic first! So, we have to decrease the seat size - maybe squeeze in an extra seat across. Also, make thin, hard seats and cram a few more rows in there. You still get a table, but luggage will now have to go under your seat, or a SMALL rollaboard (not what you used to be able to take) with you. Otherwise, pay for it to get stuck in the back and you cant get at it for the whole trip.

No more food. We can have a attendant come around with a softdrink once per trip, maybe a package to peanuts. But, no snack car, you cant decide to get up and get a drink any time you want. And expect to pay high bucks for alcohol.

As for getting up and moving around, that will be limited as well. We will allow you to get up and use the restroom - but not during the 20 minutes after leaving the station or a half hour before getting to the station. And we really will discourage people from wandering about - pretty much stay seated and buckled up unless you HAVE to be up and moving.

Your train of course is not going to go from your origin right to your destination. Those days are long gone - you will have to make a connection somewhere in a hub. And it is not like you can get out and wander around the city while you are there. As a matter of fact, you probably wont be near a city - you will be out in the country where land is cheaper, and you have to find your own transportation to and from the train station.

Your trains will be lighter, as we are going to be much more controlled than we are now. Trains will have set departure and arrival times, they will be smaller to better match route demands (no empty seats these days), and train traffic control will determine exactly when they leave. Of course that is for those who get to travel. Security regulations may prevent some people from even being able to travel by train either because they have secretly been determined to be a enemy of the country, or that their presence on the aircraft might pose a safety risk for other passengers.

The reality is that flying isn't the same as it was back in the 80s. And when you take into account all the compromises we make in order to travel by air, it really isn't the great value you would think it is. So that brings the question up not why is it so cheap, but comparatively, why is it so expensive?

As a country we made a choice to throw all our infrastructure dollars into air travel. This what we are left with. We don't have real competition for air travel to get airlines to improve service. Letting airlines charge a higher fare isn't going to make them give better service, they just make more money. Competition is what makes them provide a better product, but we lost sight of that somewhere.

Not really getting the relevance of the train discussion... :confused:

Well, the point was that for all we talk about flying being so great, and how nothing has changed since the 80s... in fact there are an awful lot of concessions passengers and in fact the public in general make towards flying that we simply don't put up with anywhere else. We would never get away with that level of limited movement, those limitations on handicapped access, and operational concessions anywhere else. So to say that train travel is the same product as flying is a bit false, just as comparing flying in the early days after deregulation, or even the period during regulation, to flying nowadays, is not really a fair comparison.

"Not really getting the relevance of the train discussion... "

I think if trains were more prevalent in the East Coast (where
population density is highest) airlines would lose their
cattle class vibe since there would be a healthy, robust alternative.
People should not be flying in jets from Raleigh NC to Washington DC for a
conference. I used to work there (NC) and couldn't believe how
common that was.