There are also a few great things about modern air travel. For one, it has gotten considerably cheaper (and thus more accessible to a broad spectrum of consumers) over time. It's also amazingly safe for travel in a metal tube at 550 MPH 35,000 feet above the earth.

There are market-based products that would address many of your concerns if you are willing to pay. Prefer a larger seat or priority boarding? Try economy plus, which will also decrease the likelihood of sitting next to a baby and may get you more attentive service. The reality though is that collectively we prefer lower prices and choose flights almost exclusively by this metric, but then gripe about all the ways air travel could be better.

One study on the cost of airfare over time: https://www.aei.org/publication/the-cost-of-air-travel-in-th...

The problem with those value-adds is that they're priced completely out of the range of the utility you might get out of it.

Remember - little things. Yeah, having a few more inches of legroom would be nice, but $50 nice? I'm well over 6" here, and the seats are designed for the lowest common denominator. Unless I get a reclining seat in first, it's gonna suck.

Priority boarding, I never understood the point of. Okay, you get on the plane a bit faster to spend more time in tiny seats. If you didn't get a window seat, you're still moving over people. For another extra $30 or so.

Say I get 'em both. I've spent an extra $80 on a ticket, and from there, I'm about halfway to first class. The extra ~$120 would get me more legroom and a mediocre meal that I could have gotten in the airport for a tenth of the price and some positive multiple of the quality. Some might bring up the free drinks at this point, but I swear the FA's are trained to tactically ignore you after about two drinks.

On top of all that, there's the psychological aspect. It feels scummy and exploitative (indeed, it is scummy and exploitative).

So a victory for the "market", I guess, at the expense of basic humanity.

There is always diminishing returns to travel upgrades. Maybe $100 (or whatever) gets you a bed but $300 get you a really comfy bed with a nice view. This also applies in all sorts of areas.

>Priority boarding, I never understood the point of.

A lot of it has to do with having overhead space. On a packed flight, you'll often have to check your carryon if you can't fit it under the seat in front of you if you're in a late boarding group.

I'm totally with you on priority boarding - I don't get the appeal at all.

All I am saying is that the market responded to our collective preferences for airlines to compete on cost -- and we benefited from this in some ways because costs have fallen over time. It's likely that the $50 you might pay for economy plus would put you even on real terms with tickets/legroom from 10-20 years ago.

Making a product horrible in order to sell "less horrible" is not a great example of a market success.

It's all in how you evaluate whether it is a horrible product. I consider economy class airfare a commodity and evaluate it on getting me to my destination safely and on time. Delays are obviously still an issue, and I do believe airlines should treat passengers as well as possible (prompt re-booking, compensation, hotel rooms, etc.) when their travel plans have been disrupted due to delays.

I also don't believe there was a historical glory day of air travel. It used to be far more expensive, with far fewer routes. International travel was MUCH more expensive, again with fewer routes. Fatal crashes were more frequent. We all used to complain about how bad airline food was...then they took it away and we complained about that too.

You don't have to believe in a "Golden Age" to think that sloth and greed drive airline operations to fall back on excuses about security and their TBTF status to monetize "less horrible" vs "horrible."

Sure it is. It's a great example of market segmentation to recapture consumer surplus.

It's worth noting that due to airline loyalty programs frequent flyers tend to have a far superior experience than the guy that only flies a couple of times a year.

It's not really "far superior" unless you have such high status that you always get upgraded--which is going to require something in the 100K+ miles/range. Airline Clubs and TSA Pre also help although those aren't directly related to frequent flyer status. There are some benefits to mid-tier status (e.g. Economy Plus on United) but you're still pretty much just flying coach and have all the same issues related to flight delays etc. as everyone else does.

100K+ miles isn't that much if you fly frequently though, a plenty of people do multiple times that.

Need to be humbled and reminded how small you are? Fly United.