>Certainly certifying pilots for a new aircraft isn't free, and probably isn't cheap, but the MAX line promises significant savings in fuel cost. In the long ru

>Certainly certifying pilots for a new aircraft isn't free, and probably isn't cheap, but the MAX line promises significant savings in fuel cost. In the long run, would the latter outweigh the former? The savings in fuel cost isn't everything, because you're missing the fact that Boeing was competing directly against the Airbus 320neo, which likely offered the same fuel economy but without the extra training costs. Why bother buying a Boeing when you can get the Airbus for less? It seems pretty obvious to me that Boeing has been milking the 737 airframe for far too long, instead of proactively developing a replacement when they had time. Instead, they just stuck with what they had, and then when Airbus came up with their plane, Boeing tried to come up with something competitive on short notice using old junk they already had. They should have developed a successor to the 737 many years ago and moved to that, spreading the development and certification costs out, but they were short-sighted and cheap, and now it's going to cost them very dearly.