4 ms·

I'm generally all for government regulations, especially when the market is such that true competition isn't really possible, but here I have to entirely blame

I'm generally all for government regulations, especially when the market is such that true competition isn't really possible, but here I have to entirely blame the consumer. There are more than sufficient airlines on major routes for competition (and you can see this when they get into fare sales for stuff like LAX-ORD for $50). Consumers could be flying airlines like Southwest and Virgin. The fact that they instead choose to fly on airlines like Frontier and Spirit shows that they don't actually care to spend the extra money to have reasonable seats or service. I especially have to scoff at tech workers, who don't lack the money to make their travel experience more pleasant, but still take redeyes to save money and then complain about how much they hate travelling. I feel like the people who are fighting for regulations on seat sizes don't understand that those regulations will cause ticket prices to go up. If you're fine with paying extra for a bigger seat, that's cool, but you can also already do that today (Economy Plus or First) without any political fighting. All you'll be doing is removing access to flying for the poorest people. As for the safety issue, I'm no expert and I haven't seen the original complaint, but the FAA already has a regulation about the maximum time it can take to evacuate a plane (and therefore a limit on the number of seats per door on the plane, effectively). This hits the airlines with no first class cabin hardest, as they actually can't pack the entire 737 full of their standard economy seat.

GordonS 9y ago
> but you can also already do that today (Economy Plus or First) True, but there is generally a big increase in price. Premium Economy is generally twice the price of Economy. Regulations to push up the Economy seat pitch to a safe level would increase prices for Economy tickets, but given the small size difference, the price increase should be rather modest.
- ilyanep 9y ago
  I wonder if you're conflating non-US carriers' Premium Economy (usually about the same size as US domestic First Class) with US carriers' "Economy plus" or similar (which is basically 4ish inches more of pitch than Economy at the same width). You can generally get the latter for a transcontinental US flight for about $200ish extra.
JoshTriplett 9y ago
> Consumers could be flying airlines like Southwest and Virgin. The fact that they instead choose to fly on airlines like Frontier and Spirit shows that they don't actually care to spend the extra money to have reasonable seats or service. Virgin is quite good; Southwest is terrible. They're known for cost, not for service. Their lack of assigned seating is one of many manifestations of that, and it's the primary reason I never fly Southwest.
- r1ch 9y ago
  I don't fly Southwest because their website is broken for what seems to be the entire Netherlands for over a year. Multiple tweets, contacts to tech emails and it still serves up an Akamai 403.
- jsmthrowaway 9y ago
  Many think of Southwest as in the same league as Frontier and Spirit, in fact. It’s a budget airline which happens to resonate with some non-budget-minded flyers, proving that you can make a budget airline half decent more than anything.
- ilyanep 9y ago
  In my experience, if you don't travel enough to have status, Southwest is one of the better companies for not being treated like a pleb and getting nickel and dimed at every turn. Furthermore, many people find no assigned seats to be a plus.
- valuearb 9y ago
  Yea I'd normally fly Alaska, but if I can't it's always Southwest. They are very good and the seats are comfortable. The value of assigned seats is fairly negligible to me.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
SilasX 9y ago
I almost agree, but IME it's not that easy to visualize the price/seat-size tradeoff in comparison shopping. Is 28 inches a lot for that dimension? Without seeing the rest of the seat, it's hard to be sure. Plus, I don't know how abusive someone is going to be about reclining the seat in front of me.
killedbydeath 9y ago
May be the first step of regulation should be requiring some standard disclosures around seat sizes, etc. If kayak or some other comparison engine showed that you would are getting 2 extra inches for the $40 more when flying Virgin instead of Frontier (hypothetical example), more people would pick Virgin.
- tacostakohashi 9y ago
  This information is freely available, e.g. on seatguru.
  - pmiller2 9y ago
    The point is to make it universally available, like the ingredients list on food packages, not just "freely available."
  - Idontagree 9y ago
    Wow, not the same thing at all as the airline disclosing it up front. I should not have to go looking at third party sites for information like that.
  - Gregaros 9y ago
    How available is knowledge if nobody knows they can attain it? This is the first I've heard of seatguru, and given the post you responded to, I'd hazard I'm not the only one.
    - kgwgk 9y ago
      Have you ever tried to search online for information about quality of seating in airplanes? In that case, I'm surprised you didn't cross seatguru before.
  - killedbydeath 9y ago
    You can go really deep down the rabbit hole of seat knowledge with Seatguru, but it's quite time consuming. Their flight search is reasonable, and probably many people who care about seats do use them. But the majority probably does not even suspect that there are major differences in seat sizes between airlines and even planes. So having that information more visible across the board would change incentives more. I also suspect given how many booking sites make money they would be dis-incentivized to do this on their own.
tacostakohashi 9y ago
Totally. I think airline travel provides one of the clearest examples of the big different between what people say they want (legroom, good quality food, friendly service), and what they will actually want / will pay for (cheap seats). Let's not forget, premium economy, business class, first class, private jets are all available in this market for people that actually want large and comfortable seats and are willing to pay more for it.
- closeparen 9y ago
  The caveat is that upgrades aren't proportional. On a $200 round trip flight, a tiny bit more legroom might cost $150 each way. It's sometimes cheaper to buy two seats! I'm not sure that the option to buy marginal comfort really exists. The higher fare classes that would deliver it are intended (and priced) for totally non-price-sensitive entities like business travelers.
bogomipz 9y ago
>There are more than sufficient airlines on major routes for competition (and you can see this when they get into fare sales for stuff like LAX-ORD for $50). Wait, so because occasionally there are routes with excess capacity this means there is sufficient competition? You seem to have confused the concept of demand competition for some reason. They are orthogonal although related concepts. Airlines having "fire sales" on fares is also not very common. Airlines have adopted a practice called "capacity discipline" which is industry speak for limiting both the number of seats and flights to a destination so as to increase the ticket price[1]. Also it doesn't seem like you are at all aware of the amount of consolidation that has gone on in the industry in the last decade, four major airlines control 80% of the market[2]. Is that your idea of sufficient competition? And there are also many instance where one or more of those 4 don't actually have a direct flight option to your particular destination. >"Consumers could be flying airlines like Southwest and Virgin. The fact that they instead choose to fly on airlines like Frontier and Spirit shows that they don't actually care to spend the extra money to have reasonable seats or service." What a bunch of nonsense straw man BS this claim is - because there is a segment of the market that selects predominantly on price means that all consumers don't care? That is beyond absurd. >"I especially have to scoff at tech workers, who don't lack the money to make their travel experience more pleasant, but still take redeyes to save money and then complain about how much they hate travelling." Most people I know take red eyes when there is no other choice, examples are an interview or late meeting on the opposite coast. It's also really odd that you believe that everyone who is a "tech worker" is by definition well off financially. There is no shortage of "tech workers" who are between jobs, starting a company and don't yet have income, free lancers, recent grads with student loan debt etc. Odder still is that fact that you have made blanket assumption about people based on their industry and then have chosen to "scoff" at them based on own your own ridiculous assumption. [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/12/business/airline-discipline-could-be-costly-for-passengers.html?mcubz=1 https://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/12/business/airline-discipli... [2] https://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/07/business/energy-environment/airlines-reap-record-profits-and-passengers-get-peanuts.html?mcubz=1 https://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/07/business/energy-environme...
valuearb 9y ago
I'm generally against most government regulations, especially in free markets, but I'm fine with the FAA making evacuation regs stricter to force airlines to go back to more leg room.
chiefalchemist 9y ago
I'm curious, why do you say competition doesn't exist?
- chiefalchemist 9y ago
  Down voted? For this question? Lol
concede_pluto 9y ago
I once got a free "upgrade" to economy plus. They seated me at a bulkhead and (because no under-seat space) required my carry-on go in the bins where I couldn't see whether my company laptop was being stolen. If instead I could get elbow room and still have something to read, that might be worthwhile.
manyxcxi 9y ago
I don't necessarily blame the consumer, per se, but I don't think regulations on seating beyond safety are entirely necessary either. I'm 6'4" and 280lbs- I'd like more length AND width so I pony up the extra $80-150 for whatever version of the economy plus exists on that carrier. I've also found that certain carrier's regular ol' economy are just fine. Delta, Southwest and Alaska routes with the newer generation of plane cabins fit me perfectly adequately. My knees are right up to the seat back in front of me but not IN the seat back in front of me. I don't bargain shop for my flights at all beside sanity checking the route prices. I'll pretty much do anything to avoid connections, and I refuse to fly United or any budget airline besides Southwest, regardless of price. I use Alaska as much as possible (live on the west coast), and Delta when I'm going to the east coast or to Europe (they partner with KLM). I've got status on both so I get all kinds of perks, and the service on Alaska, Delta, and Southwest are about as good as you're going to get in the US (at least once you get some status). I'll reluctantly fly American if they're the only suitable option for my schedule or are insanely cheaper, but I find that my three first choices generally cover the day sufficiently enough to make it work. I'm not fond of the SWA cattle call, but I've found their seats to be decently sized, their staff to be human and helpful within their power, and their focus on not nickel and diming is a breathe of fresh air.
- extra88 9y ago
  "Regulation" doesn't have to mean dictating seat size or spacing (though I think there probably should be some minimums), it can also mean requiring good labeling, making it clear to the consumer, at the time they need the information, what exactly they get for what they're paying. I think existing regulations can already be thanked for the information you get about baggage (what's included, what costs extra).
true_religion 9y ago
Given the choice, consumers would also buy cars without seatbelts of airbags simply because those new cars would cost $700... however, we as a society, have fortunately or unfortunately decided that people shouldn't be given the option to risk their lives in order to save money.

GordonS 9y ago

> but you can also already do that today (Economy Plus or First) True, but there is generally a big increase in price. Premium Economy is generally twice the price of Economy. Regulations to push up the Economy seat pitch to a safe level would increase prices for Economy tickets, but given the small size difference, the price increase should be rather modest.

ilyanep 9y ago
I wonder if you're conflating non-US carriers' Premium Economy (usually about the same size as US domestic First Class) with US carriers' "Economy plus" or similar (which is basically 4ish inches more of pitch than Economy at the same width). You can generally get the latter for a transcontinental US flight for about $200ish extra.

JoshTriplett 9y ago

> Consumers could be flying airlines like Southwest and Virgin. The fact that they instead choose to fly on airlines like Frontier and Spirit shows that they don't actually care to spend the extra money to have reasonable seats or service. Virgin is quite good; Southwest is terrible. They're known for cost, not for service. Their lack of assigned seating is one of many manifestations of that, and it's the primary reason I never fly Southwest.

r1ch 9y ago
I don't fly Southwest because their website is broken for what seems to be the entire Netherlands for over a year. Multiple tweets, contacts to tech emails and it still serves up an Akamai 403.
jsmthrowaway 9y ago
Many think of Southwest as in the same league as Frontier and Spirit, in fact. It’s a budget airline which happens to resonate with some non-budget-minded flyers, proving that you can make a budget airline half decent more than anything.
ilyanep 9y ago
In my experience, if you don't travel enough to have status, Southwest is one of the better companies for not being treated like a pleb and getting nickel and dimed at every turn. Furthermore, many people find no assigned seats to be a plus.
valuearb 9y ago
Yea I'd normally fly Alaska, but if I can't it's always Southwest. They are very good and the seats are comfortable. The value of assigned seats is fairly negligible to me.

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

SilasX 9y ago

I almost agree, but IME it's not that easy to visualize the price/seat-size tradeoff in comparison shopping. Is 28 inches a lot for that dimension? Without seeing the rest of the seat, it's hard to be sure. Plus, I don't know how abusive someone is going to be about reclining the seat in front of me.

killedbydeath 9y ago

May be the first step of regulation should be requiring some standard disclosures around seat sizes, etc. If kayak or some other comparison engine showed that you would are getting 2 extra inches for the $40 more when flying Virgin instead of Frontier (hypothetical example), more people would pick Virgin.

tacostakohashi 9y ago
This information is freely available, e.g. on seatguru.
- pmiller2 9y ago
  The point is to make it universally available, like the ingredients list on food packages, not just "freely available."
- Idontagree 9y ago
  Wow, not the same thing at all as the airline disclosing it up front. I should not have to go looking at third party sites for information like that.
- Gregaros 9y ago
  How available is knowledge if nobody knows they can attain it? This is the first I've heard of seatguru, and given the post you responded to, I'd hazard I'm not the only one.
  - kgwgk 9y ago
    Have you ever tried to search online for information about quality of seating in airplanes? In that case, I'm surprised you didn't cross seatguru before.
- killedbydeath 9y ago
  You can go really deep down the rabbit hole of seat knowledge with Seatguru, but it's quite time consuming. Their flight search is reasonable, and probably many people who care about seats do use them. But the majority probably does not even suspect that there are major differences in seat sizes between airlines and even planes. So having that information more visible across the board would change incentives more. I also suspect given how many booking sites make money they would be dis-incentivized to do this on their own.

tacostakohashi 9y ago

Totally. I think airline travel provides one of the clearest examples of the big different between what people say they want (legroom, good quality food, friendly service), and what they will actually want / will pay for (cheap seats). Let's not forget, premium economy, business class, first class, private jets are all available in this market for people that actually want large and comfortable seats and are willing to pay more for it.

closeparen 9y ago
The caveat is that upgrades aren't proportional. On a $200 round trip flight, a tiny bit more legroom might cost $150 each way. It's sometimes cheaper to buy two seats! I'm not sure that the option to buy marginal comfort really exists. The higher fare classes that would deliver it are intended (and priced) for totally non-price-sensitive entities like business travelers.

bogomipz 9y ago

>There are more than sufficient airlines on major routes for competition (and you can see this when they get into fare sales for stuff like LAX-ORD for $50). Wait, so because occasionally there are routes with excess capacity this means there is sufficient competition? You seem to have confused the concept of demand competition for some reason. They are orthogonal although related concepts. Airlines having "fire sales" on fares is also not very common. Airlines have adopted a practice called "capacity discipline" which is industry speak for limiting both the number of seats and flights to a destination so as to increase the ticket price[1]. Also it doesn't seem like you are at all aware of the amount of consolidation that has gone on in the industry in the last decade, four major airlines control 80% of the market[2]. Is that your idea of sufficient competition? And there are also many instance where one or more of those 4 don't actually have a direct flight option to your particular destination. >"Consumers could be flying airlines like Southwest and Virgin. The fact that they instead choose to fly on airlines like Frontier and Spirit shows that they don't actually care to spend the extra money to have reasonable seats or service." What a bunch of nonsense straw man BS this claim is - because there is a segment of the market that selects predominantly on price means that all consumers don't care? That is beyond absurd. >"I especially have to scoff at tech workers, who don't lack the money to make their travel experience more pleasant, but still take redeyes to save money and then complain about how much they hate travelling." Most people I know take red eyes when there is no other choice, examples are an interview or late meeting on the opposite coast. It's also really odd that you believe that everyone who is a "tech worker" is by definition well off financially. There is no shortage of "tech workers" who are between jobs, starting a company and don't yet have income, free lancers, recent grads with student loan debt etc. Odder still is that fact that you have made blanket assumption about people based on their industry and then have chosen to "scoff" at them based on own your own ridiculous assumption. [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/12/business/airline-discipline-could-be-costly-for-passengers.html?mcubz=1 https://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/12/business/airline-discipli... [2] https://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/07/business/energy-environment/airlines-reap-record-profits-and-passengers-get-peanuts.html?mcubz=1 https://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/07/business/energy-environme...

valuearb 9y ago

I'm generally against most government regulations, especially in free markets, but I'm fine with the FAA making evacuation regs stricter to force airlines to go back to more leg room.

chiefalchemist 9y ago

I'm curious, why do you say competition doesn't exist?

chiefalchemist 9y ago
Down voted? For this question? Lol

concede_pluto 9y ago

I once got a free "upgrade" to economy plus. They seated me at a bulkhead and (because no under-seat space) required my carry-on go in the bins where I couldn't see whether my company laptop was being stolen. If instead I could get elbow room and still have something to read, that might be worthwhile.

manyxcxi 9y ago

I don't necessarily blame the consumer, per se, but I don't think regulations on seating beyond safety are entirely necessary either. I'm 6'4" and 280lbs- I'd like more length AND width so I pony up the extra $80-150 for whatever version of the economy plus exists on that carrier. I've also found that certain carrier's regular ol' economy are just fine. Delta, Southwest and Alaska routes with the newer generation of plane cabins fit me perfectly adequately. My knees are right up to the seat back in front of me but not IN the seat back in front of me. I don't bargain shop for my flights at all beside sanity checking the route prices. I'll pretty much do anything to avoid connections, and I refuse to fly United or any budget airline besides Southwest, regardless of price. I use Alaska as much as possible (live on the west coast), and Delta when I'm going to the east coast or to Europe (they partner with KLM). I've got status on both so I get all kinds of perks, and the service on Alaska, Delta, and Southwest are about as good as you're going to get in the US (at least once you get some status). I'll reluctantly fly American if they're the only suitable option for my schedule or are insanely cheaper, but I find that my three first choices generally cover the day sufficiently enough to make it work. I'm not fond of the SWA cattle call, but I've found their seats to be decently sized, their staff to be human and helpful within their power, and their focus on not nickel and diming is a breathe of fresh air.

extra88 9y ago
"Regulation" doesn't have to mean dictating seat size or spacing (though I think there probably should be some minimums), it can also mean requiring good labeling, making it clear to the consumer, at the time they need the information, what exactly they get for what they're paying. I think existing regulations can already be thanked for the information you get about baggage (what's included, what costs extra).

true_religion 9y ago

Given the choice, consumers would also buy cars without seatbelts of airbags simply because those new cars would cost $700... however, we as a society, have fortunately or unfortunately decided that people shouldn't be given the option to risk their lives in order to save money.