6 ms·

I think it also highlights something: better things are possible. Zero lost suitcases doesn't require magic to achieve. It just requires enough workers or enou

by afavour 8mo ago

I think it also highlights something: better things are possible. Zero lost suitcases doesn't require magic to achieve. It just requires enough workers or enough time to make sure each worker is able to do their job successfully. Unfortunately financial and time constraints mean that very often there aren't enough workers or enough time, and some passengers suffer.

ToucanLoucan 8mo ago
Oh why even mention time constraints, we all know damn well it's financial. Every corp on the face of the earth is constantly cost-cutting everything to the bone to justify more bonuses and higher executive compensation, while making sure the service or products provided are just barely good enough where people don't stage outright riots. In the sixties, the C-suite earned 21 times what the line worker did. In 2024 it's almost 300 times. So every single time you're dealing with a product that's been value-engineered to where it barely functions, or service people paid too little and empowered too little to actually help you, or stuck in a long ass line because they won't hire enough people, or stuck talking to some damn robot because people are expensive, it's beyond a safe bet that you have an executive or several to blame.
- rectang 8mo ago
  We should be spreading our cynicism over both management and customers. There is almost no level of service so terrible that people won't buy cheaper airline tickets. Let alone losing luggage, you could dial up the risk of death and people would still buy the cheaper tickets.
  - afavour 8mo ago
    There's also something about the collapse in civility. Or... something. If you asked a plane full of passengers if they'd be happy to get their suitcase 5 minutes earlier even though it meant someone else lost theirs a lot of them would say yes.
    - psadauskas 8mo ago
      I think we can lay the blame for this on the wealthy elites, too. When people see someone better off than them greedily destroying society for their own personal gain, they naturally think "well why not me, too?".
  - bombcar 8mo ago
    We need shame, really, societal shame that we inflict on those who have to take government benefits, perhaps. Flying an airline that's known to treat their employees like shit should cause the people at the cocktail to look at you strange. (We kind of have something like this in that shopping at Costco is considered "good" but lots of people won't admit they shop at Walmart - I'm sure they'll be bankrupt soon given how many people don't shop there!)
    - eudamoniac 8mo ago
      Not sure if this is sarcasm, but Walmart earnings continue to rise. Being embarrassed to shop at Walmart is largely a coastal elite bubble situation. For a more applicable example of shame, buying "cheap Chinese crap" is usually looked down on by all demographics or alignments.
      - bombcar 8mo ago
        That was the joke, everyone (at least in the coastal elite) says they don't shop at Walmart, but they exist everywhere. Same with "cheap Chinese crap" - everyone decries it, but apparently everyone is also buying it.
        eudamoniac 8mo ago
        What I meant is that most people do admit to shopping at Walmart with no embarrassment. Not the same for buying CCC. They still buy it but they know they shouldn't. Shopping at Walmart isn't like that.
        ghaff 8mo ago
        Walmart is pretty much the only big discount store available to many people regardless of their income level unless they have personal shoppers picking stuff up for them. I have a nearby Walmart; the nearest Costco is an hour away and it's a different type of product mix anyway. I don't love shopping at Walmart for a number of reasons but it's convenient for many purposes.
  - ToucanLoucan 8mo ago
    I mean, is that a consequence of people being innately, for it's own sake, cheap to a point of farce? Or is that a consequence of fifty years of stagnant wages? I'm sure it's a healthy blend of both, but IMO, if you want to see this actually change, the first thing to even make it tenable as a possibility is the owning classes need to let some money flow down the hierarchy. Like I'm sure we'll always have our misers, our people who refuse to spend a penny more for anything, but I think the vast majority of the time what drives people to shitty retailers selling crap-quality products is that most people are fucking broke.
    - rectang 8mo ago
      > I mean, is that a consequence of people being innately, for it's own sake, cheap to a point of farce? Yes. The price-driven market segment will never disappear and is an emergent property of human nature and the dynamics of a marketplace where prices are instantly comparable. Plane tickets are way more affordable for nearly everyone than they used to be, but price competition is more savage than ever. The marketplace has spoken. While I agree that concentration of wealth at the top is a major problem, I don't think that shaking loose that wealth will change the price dynamics of the airline industry in the slightest.
  - dghlsakjg 8mo ago
    Yes, there will always be someone willing to buy on price alone, but that doesn't mean that there aren't also people who will pay more for better service. To wit: Spirit is financially fucked, mainline carriers are in better condition. The existence I think the real thing is that - in North America at least - there is a pretty good chance that a mainline carrier will treat you poorly, hit you with unexpected fees, jam you into a tiny seat, etc. For many people, the difference between an ultra-low cost carrier and a mainline carrier is whether they have to walk through first class on the way to their seats. If you are going to get treated like cattle and upsold on everything anyway, might as well save a few bucks. Given the choice between Singapore Airlines and United, I'll pay extra for SingAir because I KNOW the service will be better. Given the choice between United and Southwest, I'll just get whichever flight makes the most sense since I don't really expect United to offer better service.
    - TeMPOraL 8mo ago
      > For many people, the difference between an ultra-low cost carrier and a mainline carrier is whether they have to walk through first class on the way to their seats. If you are going to get treated like cattle and upsold on everything anyway, might as well save a few bucks. That goes beyond airlines and extends to everything. The trend I've been observing in every product and service category is the hollowing out of the middle: the market bifurcates, one part serving the cost-sensitive customers and getting stuck in a race to the bottom, the other serving premium clientele with highest-quality or bespoke goods/services, gravitating towards few customers and "if you have to ask, you can't afford it pricing". Multiplying volume by margin, "lots of cheap shit" and "few pricey sales" are both sustainable, but the middle segment - "reasonable quality for reasonable price" - is not.
      - ToucanLoucan 8mo ago
        I would argue this is because the middle class itself has been largely hollowed out. Everyone is either a millionaire or on the edge of bankruptcy, no in-between.
- jama211 8mo ago
  Well not every one on the face of this earth as that’s where Kansai airport is located. It happens a lot in America and other places too but not everywhere
gmd63 8mo ago
Also requires a culture of respect for the people who are handling baggage - an important thing lacking in parts of society in the US, where working fast food is used as a pejorative.
- observationist 8mo ago
  The culture bit is the most important. You could add 100x the current headcount at all American airports and because the workers simply don't give a shit about doing good work, because they're treating it as a 9 to 5, where they have to go and suffer through a meaningless 8 hours, or worse, they treat it like their own personal access to other people's stuff to loot at will. The TSA is security theater, a vast majority of American jobs seem to be competence theater. You only ever tend to see care and craft in small business and actual crafts. It's so rare that it's incredibly refreshing to find anyone in any business that bothers to do good work and take care of the small things. It's not about respecting the baggage handlers. It's about a culture where you respect yourself such that you are obliged to do the best work you can, whether it's baggage handling, being a CEO, or flipping burgers. Self respect and respect for the job far outweigh any notion of employers or other citizens respecting baggage handlers. They have sophisticated notions of status and face and place in society that are sadly absent in American culture. You could take the Kansai airport baggage handler team and drop them into any airline in the world, and they'd perform to the same high standard. Take any halfass United Airline baggage team and drop them at Kansai and they'd be breaking guitars, killing dogs, and all the other usual shenanigans just like back at home, and they wouldn't give a flying rat's behind about how their employer respects them or not. They're there for paychecks. Respect doesn't even enter into consideration.
  - lostlogin 8mo ago
    > You could add 100x the current headcount at all American airports and because the workers simply don't give a shit about doing good work, because they're treating it as a 9 to 5, where they have to go and suffer through a meaningless 8 hours, or worse, they treat it like their own personal access to other people's stuff to loot at will. This places the blame solely on the workers. Their CEO earns a ludicrous multiple of their wage. They are treated like shit and are expendable. It’s a two way street, treat workers with respect and and you might get some respect from them.
psadauskas 8mo ago
> financial and time constraints What a passive way to say executives kept a larger share of profits for themselves, forcing workers to be stressed and do a sub-optimal job. Its like the news reports that say "an officers weapon was discharged and someone died at the scene", rather than "a cop shot and killed a guy".
- hodgesrm 8mo ago
  > What a passive way to say executives kept a larger share of profits for themselves, forcing workers to be stressed and do a sub-optimal job. This is a very limited view of why things don't work. The main issue in my experience is whether the company values the outcome and ensures focus on optimizing for it. That can include everything from adequate staffing to comp to training to management focus. (A lot of the last one.) You can spend a huge amount of money and still get a crappy outcome. US healthcare provides a rich field of examples.
  - nick238 8mo ago
    US healthcare is a leader in administration fees (e.g. paying health system executives) compared to other countries around the world. High US healthcare cost isn't because of increased usage, but because of the higher admin fees and higher prescription drug prices. Prices are fixed high because law prevents the government from negotiating prices (o.b.o. Medicare/aid), and those provisions were inserted on behalf of pharmaceutical companies so their executives could make more money. Paying individual workers more may have some benefits, but I think the key issue is usually overworking and burnout because the incremental cost of adding a whole new employee is way higher than just pressuring workers to do more work in the same time.
bakies 8mo ago
Something I noticed when I traveled to Japan was how many workers there were just doing things. Attention to detail is so amazing. Things as simple as guiding people in the sidewalk while construction vehicles exit the site has a person dedicated to it
- spaqin 8mo ago
  That sounds more like an attempt to fight with unemployment - any job, even if unnecessary, is better than no job for both finances and mental well-being.
  - bakies 8mo ago
    Compared to America where we don't even hire grocery store check out clerks anymore. I'd rather much be in the other boat.
mc32 8mo ago
Also you need to keep organized crime out of airports. Some percentage of lost luggage is actually stolen luggage. Misrouting is also another large percentage. In the US unclaimed lost luggage ends up in some gigantic warehouse in Alabama.
- tarentel 8mo ago
  What percentage? I imagine it is insanely low. The risk to reward ratio of making money off a random bag at the airpot has got to be as low, if not lower than, the actual percentage stolen. One thing I've never been worried about it is organized crime, or anyone really, stealing my bag at an airport.
  - ummonk 8mo ago
    My understanding is it's taken as a given that the authorities at US airports aren't bothering to catch baggage / item thieves amongst airport staff. The only exception is when a firearm (or luggage containing a firearm) goes missing.
  - mc32 8mo ago
    Some airports are more notorious than others. Some suffer very little losses from theft rings, others suffer more. Ex-employees/employees abusing their access and knowledge to steal: https://abc7ny.com/post/david-lacarriere-gary-mcarthur-jfk-cargo-heist-airport/7453005/ https://abc7ny.com/post/david-lacarriere-gary-mcarthur-jfk-c... Theft ring. https://www.cbsnews.com/newyork/news/authorities-kennedy-airport-workers-busted-in-alleged-baggage-theft-ring/ https://www.cbsnews.com/newyork/news/authorities-kennedy-air... Other thieving employees. https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna22668524 https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna22668524
nielsbot 8mo ago
> financial and time constraints I read this as "profit focus"
- TeMPOraL 8mo ago
  I call that "hidden inflation", and if I were to guess, the ongoing degradation of services across the board, in every aspect, can easily account for actual inflation figures being half of what it feels they should be. It's the tiny things. Like, you visit a beauty salon or restaurant today, and compare it to the same or equivalent place 5 years ago. PDF menus instead of paper. Apps for booking instead of support staff. Leaflets where there used to be magazines to browse. No complimentary coffee. Kitchenware that used to be pristine and high-quality, is now the cheapest offering for commercial wholesaler. There's less light, worse decor, no music (or louder music, to boost turnover), worse sound-proofing, etc. Sure, the prices are the same, or maybe little higher. But the overall quality of service - not just direct service, but whole experience and ambiance - took a nosedive, so you pay a little more, for much less. You start looking for it, and the slow decay of everything becomes apparent even on the scale of months.
  - nielsbot 8mo ago
    Good points. It's sad--We really need to put checks on capitalism. I think that's the root of our major societal problems, especially in the US. (I am heartened to see more anti-capitalist comments on HN than ever.)
PostOnce 8mo ago
Very often the financial constraints are merely a euphemism for greed.

by afavour 8mo ago

ToucanLoucan 8mo ago

Oh why even mention time constraints, we all know damn well it's financial. Every corp on the face of the earth is constantly cost-cutting everything to the bone to justify more bonuses and higher executive compensation, while making sure the service or products provided are just barely good enough where people don't stage outright riots. In the sixties, the C-suite earned 21 times what the line worker did. In 2024 it's almost 300 times. So every single time you're dealing with a product that's been value-engineered to where it barely functions, or service people paid too little and empowered too little to actually help you, or stuck in a long ass line because they won't hire enough people, or stuck talking to some damn robot because people are expensive, it's beyond a safe bet that you have an executive or several to blame.

rectang 8mo ago
We should be spreading our cynicism over both management and customers. There is almost no level of service so terrible that people won't buy cheaper airline tickets. Let alone losing luggage, you could dial up the risk of death and people would still buy the cheaper tickets.
- afavour 8mo ago
  There's also something about the collapse in civility. Or... something. If you asked a plane full of passengers if they'd be happy to get their suitcase 5 minutes earlier even though it meant someone else lost theirs a lot of them would say yes.
  - psadauskas 8mo ago
    I think we can lay the blame for this on the wealthy elites, too. When people see someone better off than them greedily destroying society for their own personal gain, they naturally think "well why not me, too?".
- bombcar 8mo ago
  We need shame, really, societal shame that we inflict on those who have to take government benefits, perhaps. Flying an airline that's known to treat their employees like shit should cause the people at the cocktail to look at you strange. (We kind of have something like this in that shopping at Costco is considered "good" but lots of people won't admit they shop at Walmart - I'm sure they'll be bankrupt soon given how many people don't shop there!)
  - eudamoniac 8mo ago
    Not sure if this is sarcasm, but Walmart earnings continue to rise. Being embarrassed to shop at Walmart is largely a coastal elite bubble situation. For a more applicable example of shame, buying "cheap Chinese crap" is usually looked down on by all demographics or alignments.
    - bombcar 8mo ago
      That was the joke, everyone (at least in the coastal elite) says they don't shop at Walmart, but they exist everywhere. Same with "cheap Chinese crap" - everyone decries it, but apparently everyone is also buying it.
      - eudamoniac 8mo ago
        What I meant is that most people do admit to shopping at Walmart with no embarrassment. Not the same for buying CCC. They still buy it but they know they shouldn't. Shopping at Walmart isn't like that.
        ghaff 8mo ago
        Walmart is pretty much the only big discount store available to many people regardless of their income level unless they have personal shoppers picking stuff up for them. I have a nearby Walmart; the nearest Costco is an hour away and it's a different type of product mix anyway. I don't love shopping at Walmart for a number of reasons but it's convenient for many purposes.
- ToucanLoucan 8mo ago
  I mean, is that a consequence of people being innately, for it's own sake, cheap to a point of farce? Or is that a consequence of fifty years of stagnant wages? I'm sure it's a healthy blend of both, but IMO, if you want to see this actually change, the first thing to even make it tenable as a possibility is the owning classes need to let some money flow down the hierarchy. Like I'm sure we'll always have our misers, our people who refuse to spend a penny more for anything, but I think the vast majority of the time what drives people to shitty retailers selling crap-quality products is that most people are fucking broke.
  - rectang 8mo ago
    > I mean, is that a consequence of people being innately, for it's own sake, cheap to a point of farce? Yes. The price-driven market segment will never disappear and is an emergent property of human nature and the dynamics of a marketplace where prices are instantly comparable. Plane tickets are way more affordable for nearly everyone than they used to be, but price competition is more savage than ever. The marketplace has spoken. While I agree that concentration of wealth at the top is a major problem, I don't think that shaking loose that wealth will change the price dynamics of the airline industry in the slightest.
- dghlsakjg 8mo ago
  Yes, there will always be someone willing to buy on price alone, but that doesn't mean that there aren't also people who will pay more for better service. To wit: Spirit is financially fucked, mainline carriers are in better condition. The existence I think the real thing is that - in North America at least - there is a pretty good chance that a mainline carrier will treat you poorly, hit you with unexpected fees, jam you into a tiny seat, etc. For many people, the difference between an ultra-low cost carrier and a mainline carrier is whether they have to walk through first class on the way to their seats. If you are going to get treated like cattle and upsold on everything anyway, might as well save a few bucks. Given the choice between Singapore Airlines and United, I'll pay extra for SingAir because I KNOW the service will be better. Given the choice between United and Southwest, I'll just get whichever flight makes the most sense since I don't really expect United to offer better service.
  - TeMPOraL 8mo ago
    > For many people, the difference between an ultra-low cost carrier and a mainline carrier is whether they have to walk through first class on the way to their seats. If you are going to get treated like cattle and upsold on everything anyway, might as well save a few bucks. That goes beyond airlines and extends to everything. The trend I've been observing in every product and service category is the hollowing out of the middle: the market bifurcates, one part serving the cost-sensitive customers and getting stuck in a race to the bottom, the other serving premium clientele with highest-quality or bespoke goods/services, gravitating towards few customers and "if you have to ask, you can't afford it pricing". Multiplying volume by margin, "lots of cheap shit" and "few pricey sales" are both sustainable, but the middle segment - "reasonable quality for reasonable price" - is not.
    - ToucanLoucan 8mo ago
      I would argue this is because the middle class itself has been largely hollowed out. Everyone is either a millionaire or on the edge of bankruptcy, no in-between.
jama211 8mo ago
Well not every one on the face of this earth as that’s where Kansai airport is located. It happens a lot in America and other places too but not everywhere

gmd63 8mo ago

Also requires a culture of respect for the people who are handling baggage - an important thing lacking in parts of society in the US, where working fast food is used as a pejorative.

observationist 8mo ago
The culture bit is the most important. You could add 100x the current headcount at all American airports and because the workers simply don't give a shit about doing good work, because they're treating it as a 9 to 5, where they have to go and suffer through a meaningless 8 hours, or worse, they treat it like their own personal access to other people's stuff to loot at will. The TSA is security theater, a vast majority of American jobs seem to be competence theater. You only ever tend to see care and craft in small business and actual crafts. It's so rare that it's incredibly refreshing to find anyone in any business that bothers to do good work and take care of the small things. It's not about respecting the baggage handlers. It's about a culture where you respect yourself such that you are obliged to do the best work you can, whether it's baggage handling, being a CEO, or flipping burgers. Self respect and respect for the job far outweigh any notion of employers or other citizens respecting baggage handlers. They have sophisticated notions of status and face and place in society that are sadly absent in American culture. You could take the Kansai airport baggage handler team and drop them into any airline in the world, and they'd perform to the same high standard. Take any halfass United Airline baggage team and drop them at Kansai and they'd be breaking guitars, killing dogs, and all the other usual shenanigans just like back at home, and they wouldn't give a flying rat's behind about how their employer respects them or not. They're there for paychecks. Respect doesn't even enter into consideration.
- lostlogin 8mo ago
  > You could add 100x the current headcount at all American airports and because the workers simply don't give a shit about doing good work, because they're treating it as a 9 to 5, where they have to go and suffer through a meaningless 8 hours, or worse, they treat it like their own personal access to other people's stuff to loot at will. This places the blame solely on the workers. Their CEO earns a ludicrous multiple of their wage. They are treated like shit and are expendable. It’s a two way street, treat workers with respect and and you might get some respect from them.

psadauskas 8mo ago

> financial and time constraints What a passive way to say executives kept a larger share of profits for themselves, forcing workers to be stressed and do a sub-optimal job. Its like the news reports that say "an officers weapon was discharged and someone died at the scene", rather than "a cop shot and killed a guy".

hodgesrm 8mo ago
> What a passive way to say executives kept a larger share of profits for themselves, forcing workers to be stressed and do a sub-optimal job. This is a very limited view of why things don't work. The main issue in my experience is whether the company values the outcome and ensures focus on optimizing for it. That can include everything from adequate staffing to comp to training to management focus. (A lot of the last one.) You can spend a huge amount of money and still get a crappy outcome. US healthcare provides a rich field of examples.
- nick238 8mo ago
  US healthcare is a leader in administration fees (e.g. paying health system executives) compared to other countries around the world. High US healthcare cost isn't because of increased usage, but because of the higher admin fees and higher prescription drug prices. Prices are fixed high because law prevents the government from negotiating prices (o.b.o. Medicare/aid), and those provisions were inserted on behalf of pharmaceutical companies so their executives could make more money. Paying individual workers more may have some benefits, but I think the key issue is usually overworking and burnout because the incremental cost of adding a whole new employee is way higher than just pressuring workers to do more work in the same time.

bakies 8mo ago

Something I noticed when I traveled to Japan was how many workers there were just doing things. Attention to detail is so amazing. Things as simple as guiding people in the sidewalk while construction vehicles exit the site has a person dedicated to it

spaqin 8mo ago
That sounds more like an attempt to fight with unemployment - any job, even if unnecessary, is better than no job for both finances and mental well-being.
- bakies 8mo ago
  Compared to America where we don't even hire grocery store check out clerks anymore. I'd rather much be in the other boat.

mc32 8mo ago

Also you need to keep organized crime out of airports. Some percentage of lost luggage is actually stolen luggage. Misrouting is also another large percentage. In the US unclaimed lost luggage ends up in some gigantic warehouse in Alabama.

tarentel 8mo ago
What percentage? I imagine it is insanely low. The risk to reward ratio of making money off a random bag at the airpot has got to be as low, if not lower than, the actual percentage stolen. One thing I've never been worried about it is organized crime, or anyone really, stealing my bag at an airport.
- ummonk 8mo ago
  My understanding is it's taken as a given that the authorities at US airports aren't bothering to catch baggage / item thieves amongst airport staff. The only exception is when a firearm (or luggage containing a firearm) goes missing.
- mc32 8mo ago
  Some airports are more notorious than others. Some suffer very little losses from theft rings, others suffer more. Ex-employees/employees abusing their access and knowledge to steal: https://abc7ny.com/post/david-lacarriere-gary-mcarthur-jfk-cargo-heist-airport/7453005/ https://abc7ny.com/post/david-lacarriere-gary-mcarthur-jfk-c... Theft ring. https://www.cbsnews.com/newyork/news/authorities-kennedy-airport-workers-busted-in-alleged-baggage-theft-ring/ https://www.cbsnews.com/newyork/news/authorities-kennedy-air... Other thieving employees. https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna22668524 https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna22668524

nielsbot 8mo ago

> financial and time constraints I read this as "profit focus"

TeMPOraL 8mo ago
I call that "hidden inflation", and if I were to guess, the ongoing degradation of services across the board, in every aspect, can easily account for actual inflation figures being half of what it feels they should be. It's the tiny things. Like, you visit a beauty salon or restaurant today, and compare it to the same or equivalent place 5 years ago. PDF menus instead of paper. Apps for booking instead of support staff. Leaflets where there used to be magazines to browse. No complimentary coffee. Kitchenware that used to be pristine and high-quality, is now the cheapest offering for commercial wholesaler. There's less light, worse decor, no music (or louder music, to boost turnover), worse sound-proofing, etc. Sure, the prices are the same, or maybe little higher. But the overall quality of service - not just direct service, but whole experience and ambiance - took a nosedive, so you pay a little more, for much less. You start looking for it, and the slow decay of everything becomes apparent even on the scale of months.
- nielsbot 8mo ago
  Good points. It's sad--We really need to put checks on capitalism. I think that's the root of our major societal problems, especially in the US. (I am heartened to see more anti-capitalist comments on HN than ever.)

PostOnce 8mo ago

Very often the financial constraints are merely a euphemism for greed.