It looks nice, but personally, I'm ok with the change. I'd rather pay (much) less and not get the fancy food on a flight I'm probably going to sleep through anyway. And, as the article says, the current first class experience still offers an upgrade.
Remembering the Golden Age of Airline Food
51–60 of 75 posts
Re: Remembering the Golden Age of Airline Food
#52When comparing "flying then" to "flying now", you need to look at the real cost of the flights. Yes, the experience in economy class has got worse, but the cost of the ticket has also significantly dropped. In 2021 dollars, the cost of a round trip air fare has basically halved since 1979. You could buy a business class ticket now for a comparable price to economy back then. https://www.airlines.org/dataset/annual-ro…
I am waiting for the day going to the toilet during flight and be faced with a contactless payment terminal to open the door.
That would run into the FAA; there are a number of things that happen on flights that are mandated by the FAA, I suspect restrooms (and the drinks) are some of them for health reasons.
Re: Remembering the Golden Age of Airline Food
#53When it's an option, fly Lufthansa. At least in their transatlantic flights, the food was excellent even though I was in cramped economy class. As I recall I had a type of beef stew, potatoes and carrots, salad, bread rolls, butter, and a nice ice cream for dessert.
On domestic flights, I miss Southwest Airlines pre-9/11 snack packs. They had cheese, crackers, cookies, and fruit like apple sauce. Nice pick-me-up in the middle of a three hour flight.
Re: Remembering the Golden Age of Airline Food
#54Earlier quoted context omitted.
It would only take a couple of terrorist incidences on the train to make the experience as painful as flying already is.
Trains can be and have been blown up. But that's mostly harmless compared to the horrors that could be done to a fully occupied road tunnel with a few well coordinated trucks. Should we stop building roads? Planes are an exceptional target because they can be deviated to foreign countries or to dramatic impact sites and because are so isolated while in the air. Neither applies to trains.
Also perfect train security doesn't protect against something on the track, and you can't adequately protect thousands of miles of track. You can reduce, but not eliminate, the risk.
A plane is a self-contained system and most people don't have access to surface-to-air missiles.
Re: Remembering the Golden Age of Airline Food
#55When comparing "flying then" to "flying now", you need to look at the real cost of the flights. Yes, the experience in economy class has got worse, but the cost of the ticket has also significantly dropped. In 2021 dollars, the cost of a round trip air fare has basically halved since 1979. You could buy a business class ticket now for a comparable price to economy back then. https://www.airlines.org/dataset/annual-ro…
> round trip air fare has basically halved since 1979 I don't think that number will hold up if you include square feet of personal space and lbs of luggage that might need extra fees.
That's the point, though - what you get has diminished, but the trade is that you pay substantially less. If you want more, you can still pay for premium economy or business. It's better to enable people with less money to fly, while still letting people get a better experience if they want to spend more.
Re: Remembering the Golden Age of Airline Food
#56When comparing "flying then" to "flying now", you need to look at the real cost of the flights. Yes, the experience in economy class has got worse, but the cost of the ticket has also significantly dropped. In 2021 dollars, the cost of a round trip air fare has basically halved since 1979. You could buy a business class ticket now for a comparable price to economy back then. https://www.airlines.org/dataset/annual-ro…
> You could buy a business class ticket now for a comparable price to economy back then. And if you buy business class, you end up with a lie flat seat that will likely be better than the economy seat you could buy at the time. In addition, the aircrafts now are more comfortable with much less noise and higher cabin pressures. In addition, flying is much safer now than it was in the 1960s.
This is an article about US airline domestic flights, so none of that is in business class.
Re: Remembering the Golden Age of Airline Food
#57The Asian airlines I've used (JAL, ANA, Singapore, AirAsia) have been pretty damn good. It's hard to mess up curry and rice; you get salad, side dishes, bread, ice cream and alcohol. Many of the dishes are designed by famous chefs, even in economy.
I had a fine time on JAL, theyve come a long way since being responsible for one of the more infamous food/air incidents - the poop plane: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japan_Air_Lines_food_poisoni...
Ah, yes, the inspiration for the 1980 documentary Airplane!, with Leslie Nielson:
Re: Remembering the Golden Age of Airline Food
#58These kind of articles are always dumb and never make an apples to apples comparison. It talks about Pan Am in the 1950s. In May 1952 Pan Am tickets for New York - London roundtrip in economy class were $486. And that was the minimum legal price. Presumably you could find yourself paying more depending on demand. That's equivalent to $5,584 today. Google Flights tells me I can get a first class ticket on that route f…
Flying was for the rich until the 1970s. The name "Airbus" describes it perfectly.
And yet the article says the reason is basically "capitalism bad":
> you had airline deregulation by a guy who was an acolyte of Ronald Reagan.
> The more horrible you make it to fly coach, the more business people will demand to fly business and first class. The airlines make a bucket of money off people traveling up front, which is why they make coach as oppressive as possible.
Yeah no, deregulation made it so the average person could travel by plane at all.
Re: Remembering the Golden Age of Airline Food
#59Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's another reminder that terrorists have won, and have ruined the flight experience for everyone. You basically get searched in order to board. Nobody agrees to have even the slightest risk of a a plane to be hijacked in exchange of not having all of these security measures (which, in a significant part, are a security theater).
Maybe the fear-mongerers have won instead? There are lots of public places/events that don't require any searches/background checks and where a bomb would yield a significant number of casualties and terror to blowing up a regional jet, yet we don't seem to be having explosions every other day. Maybe the terrorist threat is overblown and is merely kept around as a convenient excuse for more surveillance/repression?
"fearmonger" and "terrorist" have strikingly similar definitions.
Re: Remembering the Golden Age of Airline Food
#60Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's another reminder that terrorists have won, and have ruined the flight experience for everyone. You basically get searched in order to board. Nobody agrees to have even the slightest risk of a a plane to be hijacked in exchange of not having all of these security measures (which, in a significant part, are a security theater).
Maybe the fear-mongerers have won instead? There are lots of public places/events that don't require any searches/background checks and where a bomb would yield a significant number of casualties and terror to blowing up a regional jet, yet we don't seem to be having explosions every other day. Maybe the terrorist threat is overblown and is merely kept around as a convenient excuse for more surveillance/repression?
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