88 characters per line is a weird choice. Why not 90?
Originally PEP 8 had 79 characters. Now that was a weird choice so most companies went with 80 instead, including Facebook. You want a low-ish limit because it makes it possible to fit two files side by side on a typical screen resolution. Even if you don't edit like that, you look at diffs like that. More importantly, a low column limit is helpful to disabled engineers who don't have to navigate horizontally so much…
I saw that you mentioned that - where have you seen a study that claims 100 is the cutoff? Would be interested in seeing that.