>Jim Devine wrote:
>
>>I read some stats in LBO awhile back that indicated that price-deregulation
>>didn't really lead to lower airline ticket prices. Doug?
>
>Yup, this is a long-standing LBO obsession. See other post. The dereg
>partisans like to quote real fares per seat-mile, which are down
>since dereg. Problem is people aren't seats. They have to fly longer
>now - one or two stops have become the norm. Flying from NYC to
>Virginia? Change planes in Chicago. If you wanted to fly from NY to
>Seattle tomorrow, it'd probably cost you around $1,800 round trip.
>You could save $1,200 on that by buying 3 or more weeks in advance,
>but long gone are the days of $200 cross-country flights. But that's
>because demand is strong. It'll be very interesting to see what
>happens in the next recession. In the early 1990s, the cumulative
>losses of the airline industry exceeded its cumulative profits
>starting from the days of the Wright Bros. first flight. When demand
>is weak, the temptation to sell otherwise empty seats below cost is
>enormous.
>
>Doug
$200 round trip or $200 one way?
Brad DeLong, thinking of flying to Paris for $486 roundtrip in late march...
