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"We did that Uber shit before it was cool." -- The airlines. Another thing that surprises most people is how expensive business and first class are, relative t

"We did that Uber shit before it was cool." -- The airlines. Another thing that surprises most people is how expensive business and first class are, relative to coach. After all, if you're only getting 1.5-2x as much space, it doesn't seem fair that you'd have to pay 10x prices. The truth is that many of those seats are filled via upgrades to frequent fliers and more fairly priced in that view. But someone who asks for an assured first-class seat (which is where the 5-10x premium is charged) is identifying himself as a captive buyer. About half of the first-class seats are upgrades (especially to make room, because airlines often overbook) given that day, and those are cheap or free, but the other half are a mix of business travelers under time pressure, invited conference speakers whose flights are booked by a third-party, and people with disabilities. While people complain about the "assholes" in first class getting marginally better treatment, a surprising percentage of the people up there aren't rich at all, but have disabilities (e.g. back and knee problems) and can't fly coach, and those people fly once a year (!!) at most, because they can barely afford it. Perversely, the disabled guy of modest means is going to see a higher fare for a first-class seat than a business traveler on a corporate rate. Oddly enough, air travel is getting to the point where airlines are intentionally making coach travel worse to make up for a decline of first- and business-class passengers since 2008. While one might think that the purpose of the checked bag fees is to make a little extra money (and that's part of it) there's a much larger gain in filling up the overhead bins (thanks to those horrid checked-bag fees, overhead bins always fill up early) and then selling early boarding for $50 per ticket. Waiting spaces at many terminals have been deliberately neglected for acoustics and outlets, to push people into buying first-class tickets just to have access to the lounges. Natural demand for first class seats hasn't recovered since 2007 and, even with the economy back, it won't, so air travel is now an experience where unpleasantness is deliberately induced.

johnlabaptise 12y ago
"if you're only getting 1.5-2x as much space, it doesn't seem fair that you'd have to pay 10x prices" Business aren't obligated to offer you prices that you think are fair. I don't understand why people think they are. When people say something is a rip-off or unfairly priced what they really mean is that they aren't willing to pay that price for the product. What a business chooses to charge you is entirely up to them, and they can be as rational or irrational in your eyes as they like.
- michaelochurch 12y ago
  I don't think that it's dynamic pricing that makes people hate the airlines. It's the rash of bad-faith activity around the dynamic pricing. For example, decreasing legroom and forcing disabled people into business class tickets they wouldn't have needed, were it 20 years ago when coach seats had enough room, is bad-faith activity. Likewise, this "boarding group" nonsense where "Group 5" means you'll have no overhead space and have to wait at a fucking baggage claim, despite carrying your bags to the terminal, is bad-faith activity. So is (in Asia) denying airport lounge access to coach passengers instead of pricing it a la carte as is done in the US, and so is the non-transferability of tickets (which is disingenuously argued to be because of 9/11, but really is just there to steal from people). There's a ton that airlines do that is dishonest, in bad faith, and generally engineered to make for an unpleasant experience in coach, just to make up for the continuing decline in demand for first-class travel due to (a) teleconferencing in business, and (b) better medications for sleep and relaxation (e.g. modern benzodiazepines). If you want to charge some narcissistic business executive 10x for 50% more room, go ahead. But that's not what we're talking about.
  - icebraining 12y ago
    For example, decreasing legroom and forcing disabled people into business class tickets they wouldn't have needed, were it 20 years ago when coach seats had enough room, is bad-faith activity. How are coach ticket prices now compared to 20 years ago? It's not bad faith if it's a way of decreasing prices (by packing more people) for most clients.
    - jdmichal 12y ago
      User canvia posted information about this in another tree [0][1]. I think a good summary would be decreasing prices up until about 2003, when they seem to level out around the high $300's, with an apparently exceptional drop in years 2009-2010. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8752643 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8752643 [1] http://www.rita.dot.gov/bts/airfares/programs/economics_and_finance/air_travel_price_index/html/AnnualFares.html http://www.rita.dot.gov/bts/airfares/programs/economics_and_...
phantom784 12y ago
People buy first class tickets just for the lounges? Usually, you can just pay $30 or so for a day pass to a lounge.
- chrisseaton 12y ago
  $30 for a day pass to a first class lounge? I can't believe that at all. Can you show me which airports and lounges offer that because I'm going to take them up on it.
  - spdustin 12y ago
    Um... All airports with United or American lounges? It's $50 a day, though. With American, they actively try to sell you a day pass on their in-airport check-in terminals. Edit: please don't correct actual life experience with a quote from Wikipedia. United Club is the name of their "first class" lounge, as people incorrectly refer to them. Those United Club Lounges have complimentary booze [1]. And no airline is going to allow a passenger to board who had obviously consumed the amount of alcohol you're referring to. I know: I practically lived at the T3 United Club lounge at O'Hare for many years, I was traveling so much. Not as much any more, but when I've been delayed significantly and I'm super-stressed because I'm speaking at a conference or something, I still occasionally get a day pass. The United lounges you're referring to are considerably more elite, and most travelers don't even know they exist. Again, taken from actual experience and not a quick perusal of a Wikipedia article. American's "Admiral's Club" [2] no longer offers complimentary liquor. [1] http://www.united.com/web/en-US/content/travel/airport/lounge/amenities.aspx http://www.united.com/web/en-US/content/travel/airport/loung... [2] https://www.aa.com/i18n/travelInformation/airportAmenities/AdmiralsLocations.jsp?anchorLocation=DirectURL&title=admiralsclublocations https://www.aa.com/i18n/travelInformation/airportAmenities/A...
    - chrisseaton 12y ago
      That's United Club - that's not the first class lounge at all. If you read the wikipedia page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Club http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Club it says you can buy access to United Club, but doesn't say that about the first class lounge. In fact it says: "the access rules are significantly more restrictive than for United Club. Access to Global First Lounges is generally restricted to United Global First passengers, Star Alliance First Class customers, and Global Services passengers confirmed in Business Class." In the first class lounge you get free food and drink including alcohol. If you could really get in for $50 a day, you could easily eat and drink that much worth.
yummyfajitas 12y ago
"Uber shit" is having a single transparent price that fluctuates with market forces. That's not remotely what airlines do.
- michaelochurch 12y ago
  Airlines (Soviet service and morale, capitalistic price fluctuation) are a perfect microcosm of corporate capitalism, which exists to give the worst of both systems (that is, capitalism and socialism) to the masses and the best of both (social safety net/impunity of socialism, extreme upside of capitalism) to a well-connected elite (often called "the 1%", but closer to 0.1%).
  - saryant 12y ago
    Considering airfares are the cheapest they've ever been in the US, I don't know how that's even remotely true. More of "the masses" are able to fly than ever before.
    - gcb0 12y ago
      it's not cheap because the system works. it's cheaper because more and more jobs require constant travel so they have much more of the good predative revenue. for example at work I've never seen a 300 mile trip for less than 350. ever. let alone the la-Chicago for 100 they mention in the article. that would look like a bug in my employee's booking system. what they get from the rest is just icing. so, convince yourself of that lie all you want. but the system continues to be awful and inefficient. only the demand changed. to their advantage.
      - monksy 12y ago
        You're not looking very hard, and you're seeing discount hub connections. It's incredibly easy to get a 600$+ ticket for that many miles. [I'm not talking about business or first class tickets.] The cheapest you can go is about $60 on advanced LA-SFO OW tickets. (Outside of Southwest or the discount flights).
lizzard 12y ago
Disabled people do not have to buy first class tickets. I am disabled, and often am seated in the very back of the airplane. There is a narrow aisle chair (a very skinny wheelchair) to help people get into the plane and through a plane's aisles. Airline agents at the gate often nicely switch my seats closer to the front of the plane, but not to first class. You are claiming some things that absolutely aren't true, here.
- leoedin 12y ago
  I don't think the comment author claimed that disabled people have to travel first class, but that some people with disabilities choose to travel business or first class because travelling in economy is too painful / not practical.
  - michaelochurch 12y ago
    Right. I wasn't saying that everyone with a disability had to travel first class. There are various different kinds of disability.
raverbashing 12y ago
Sometimes you can get a business class by a nice price (something like 1.5x a regular ticket), it depends And it's not only about the space, it's the service + luggage allowance + flexibility
- jdmichal 12y ago
  I've had a first-class upgrade be only $15 more than the checked bag fee. One should always check the price and compare it to the fees they are expecting to pay anyway.
- robotresearcher 12y ago
  and using the short lines at the airport, and the lounge.
mcot2 12y ago
Jet Blue mint is $599 from jfk to sfo or lax. I commend them for only pricing the premium experience at 2-3x.
jusben1369 12y ago
I wonder if we're confusing cause and effect here. Are half of those first class seats upgrades because they couldn't be sold? Or are they priced at such an exorbitant price and manipulated to ensure half remain free to reward high revenue frequent fliers? You seem to be implying the latter.
saganus 12y ago
This sounds like this would be fertile grounds for an airline to be disruptive. Imagine what would happen if there was an airline that could set fixed prices for, let's say, the next 2 or 4 weeks. So you can search for a ticket price on the 1st of a month and it would be the same as on the last day of the month. I know that this is probably not realistic since you can't just open up an airline like you can a startup, but it would be interesting if it was possible and see who gets a bigger revenue/piece of the pie: the airlines with the uber-sophisticated yield management systems, or the one that treats customers as people and not factors in an equation. It's probably very difficult to even do the mental experiment, but I sure would be glad to see these kind of companies show up. I know there are already lots of companies that treat customers as their most valued asset instead of just a cash-cow, and almost in all cases that I can think of, these companies are doing great precisely because there's more and more people that want to be treated like people, and are willing to pay extra for that, instead of getting the lowest price and be kicked in the behind in the process.
- eru 12y ago
  It's actually pretty easy to open an airline, all things considered. You don't need that much capital, since you can lease the planes. And you get your fare revenue before you render the service---ie an inherently cash flow positive business.

johnlabaptise 12y ago

"if you're only getting 1.5-2x as much space, it doesn't seem fair that you'd have to pay 10x prices" Business aren't obligated to offer you prices that you think are fair. I don't understand why people think they are. When people say something is a rip-off or unfairly priced what they really mean is that they aren't willing to pay that price for the product. What a business chooses to charge you is entirely up to them, and they can be as rational or irrational in your eyes as they like.

michaelochurch 12y ago
I don't think that it's dynamic pricing that makes people hate the airlines. It's the rash of bad-faith activity around the dynamic pricing. For example, decreasing legroom and forcing disabled people into business class tickets they wouldn't have needed, were it 20 years ago when coach seats had enough room, is bad-faith activity. Likewise, this "boarding group" nonsense where "Group 5" means you'll have no overhead space and have to wait at a fucking baggage claim, despite carrying your bags to the terminal, is bad-faith activity. So is (in Asia) denying airport lounge access to coach passengers instead of pricing it a la carte as is done in the US, and so is the non-transferability of tickets (which is disingenuously argued to be because of 9/11, but really is just there to steal from people). There's a ton that airlines do that is dishonest, in bad faith, and generally engineered to make for an unpleasant experience in coach, just to make up for the continuing decline in demand for first-class travel due to (a) teleconferencing in business, and (b) better medications for sleep and relaxation (e.g. modern benzodiazepines). If you want to charge some narcissistic business executive 10x for 50% more room, go ahead. But that's not what we're talking about.
- icebraining 12y ago
  For example, decreasing legroom and forcing disabled people into business class tickets they wouldn't have needed, were it 20 years ago when coach seats had enough room, is bad-faith activity. How are coach ticket prices now compared to 20 years ago? It's not bad faith if it's a way of decreasing prices (by packing more people) for most clients.
  - jdmichal 12y ago
    User canvia posted information about this in another tree [0][1]. I think a good summary would be decreasing prices up until about 2003, when they seem to level out around the high $300's, with an apparently exceptional drop in years 2009-2010. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8752643 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8752643 [1] http://www.rita.dot.gov/bts/airfares/programs/economics_and_finance/air_travel_price_index/html/AnnualFares.html http://www.rita.dot.gov/bts/airfares/programs/economics_and_...

phantom784 12y ago

People buy first class tickets just for the lounges? Usually, you can just pay $30 or so for a day pass to a lounge.

chrisseaton 12y ago
$30 for a day pass to a first class lounge? I can't believe that at all. Can you show me which airports and lounges offer that because I'm going to take them up on it.
- spdustin 12y ago
  Um... All airports with United or American lounges? It's $50 a day, though. With American, they actively try to sell you a day pass on their in-airport check-in terminals. Edit: please don't correct actual life experience with a quote from Wikipedia. United Club is the name of their "first class" lounge, as people incorrectly refer to them. Those United Club Lounges have complimentary booze [1]. And no airline is going to allow a passenger to board who had obviously consumed the amount of alcohol you're referring to. I know: I practically lived at the T3 United Club lounge at O'Hare for many years, I was traveling so much. Not as much any more, but when I've been delayed significantly and I'm super-stressed because I'm speaking at a conference or something, I still occasionally get a day pass. The United lounges you're referring to are considerably more elite, and most travelers don't even know they exist. Again, taken from actual experience and not a quick perusal of a Wikipedia article. American's "Admiral's Club" [2] no longer offers complimentary liquor. [1] http://www.united.com/web/en-US/content/travel/airport/lounge/amenities.aspx http://www.united.com/web/en-US/content/travel/airport/loung... [2] https://www.aa.com/i18n/travelInformation/airportAmenities/AdmiralsLocations.jsp?anchorLocation=DirectURL&title=admiralsclublocations https://www.aa.com/i18n/travelInformation/airportAmenities/A...
  - chrisseaton 12y ago
    That's United Club - that's not the first class lounge at all. If you read the wikipedia page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Club http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Club it says you can buy access to United Club, but doesn't say that about the first class lounge. In fact it says: "the access rules are significantly more restrictive than for United Club. Access to Global First Lounges is generally restricted to United Global First passengers, Star Alliance First Class customers, and Global Services passengers confirmed in Business Class." In the first class lounge you get free food and drink including alcohol. If you could really get in for $50 a day, you could easily eat and drink that much worth.

yummyfajitas 12y ago

"Uber shit" is having a single transparent price that fluctuates with market forces. That's not remotely what airlines do.

michaelochurch 12y ago
Airlines (Soviet service and morale, capitalistic price fluctuation) are a perfect microcosm of corporate capitalism, which exists to give the worst of both systems (that is, capitalism and socialism) to the masses and the best of both (social safety net/impunity of socialism, extreme upside of capitalism) to a well-connected elite (often called "the 1%", but closer to 0.1%).
- saryant 12y ago
  Considering airfares are the cheapest they've ever been in the US, I don't know how that's even remotely true. More of "the masses" are able to fly than ever before.
  - gcb0 12y ago
    it's not cheap because the system works. it's cheaper because more and more jobs require constant travel so they have much more of the good predative revenue. for example at work I've never seen a 300 mile trip for less than 350. ever. let alone the la-Chicago for 100 they mention in the article. that would look like a bug in my employee's booking system. what they get from the rest is just icing. so, convince yourself of that lie all you want. but the system continues to be awful and inefficient. only the demand changed. to their advantage.
    - monksy 12y ago
      You're not looking very hard, and you're seeing discount hub connections. It's incredibly easy to get a 600$+ ticket for that many miles. [I'm not talking about business or first class tickets.] The cheapest you can go is about $60 on advanced LA-SFO OW tickets. (Outside of Southwest or the discount flights).

lizzard 12y ago

Disabled people do not have to buy first class tickets. I am disabled, and often am seated in the very back of the airplane. There is a narrow aisle chair (a very skinny wheelchair) to help people get into the plane and through a plane's aisles. Airline agents at the gate often nicely switch my seats closer to the front of the plane, but not to first class. You are claiming some things that absolutely aren't true, here.

leoedin 12y ago
I don't think the comment author claimed that disabled people have to travel first class, but that some people with disabilities choose to travel business or first class because travelling in economy is too painful / not practical.
- michaelochurch 12y ago
  Right. I wasn't saying that everyone with a disability had to travel first class. There are various different kinds of disability.

raverbashing 12y ago

Sometimes you can get a business class by a nice price (something like 1.5x a regular ticket), it depends And it's not only about the space, it's the service + luggage allowance + flexibility

jdmichal 12y ago
I've had a first-class upgrade be only $15 more than the checked bag fee. One should always check the price and compare it to the fees they are expecting to pay anyway.
robotresearcher 12y ago
and using the short lines at the airport, and the lounge.

mcot2 12y ago

Jet Blue mint is $599 from jfk to sfo or lax. I commend them for only pricing the premium experience at 2-3x.

jusben1369 12y ago

I wonder if we're confusing cause and effect here. Are half of those first class seats upgrades because they couldn't be sold? Or are they priced at such an exorbitant price and manipulated to ensure half remain free to reward high revenue frequent fliers? You seem to be implying the latter.

saganus 12y ago

This sounds like this would be fertile grounds for an airline to be disruptive. Imagine what would happen if there was an airline that could set fixed prices for, let's say, the next 2 or 4 weeks. So you can search for a ticket price on the 1st of a month and it would be the same as on the last day of the month. I know that this is probably not realistic since you can't just open up an airline like you can a startup, but it would be interesting if it was possible and see who gets a bigger revenue/piece of the pie: the airlines with the uber-sophisticated yield management systems, or the one that treats customers as people and not factors in an equation. It's probably very difficult to even do the mental experiment, but I sure would be glad to see these kind of companies show up. I know there are already lots of companies that treat customers as their most valued asset instead of just a cash-cow, and almost in all cases that I can think of, these companies are doing great precisely because there's more and more people that want to be treated like people, and are willing to pay extra for that, instead of getting the lowest price and be kicked in the behind in the process.

eru 12y ago
It's actually pretty easy to open an airline, all things considered. You don't need that much capital, since you can lease the planes. And you get your fare revenue before you render the service---ie an inherently cash flow positive business.