Air Fares 101 – Why do fares change all the time?
"We did that Uber shit before it was cool." -- The airlines.<p>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 <i>assured</i> 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 <i>can't</i> 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.<p>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.