by thenewgreen

CEO: "Okay. Let's get real here. Just in case you were in a coma for the last 25 years, airlines have done nothing but lose money. In fact, since its beginnings the U.S. airline industry hasn't made a dime. Quite the contrary, it has lost billions upon billions. And why? Because of you. "That's because whenever we raise fares to a profitable level, you stay home. Or you take the damned BoltBus. Or you drive to grandma's house (did you miss the memo that driving is 100 times more dangerous than flying?). Please. Airfares, since the 1978 deregulation legislation that nearly killed our airline, are a freaking bargain. "Over the past umpteen decades, whenever we sold you a ticket, on average we lost money on the deal. Exactly what would you have us do? All of us go out of business? Yeah, well have fun taking BoltBus to Paris. “You complain that we’ve been nickel and diming you. But guess what? You’ve been nickel and diming us ever since deregulation. If one of our competitors has a fare a couple of dollars less, you fly them, not us. You have no brand loyalty. All you care about is price, not comfort, or legroom, or service, or even frequent flyer miles. “So what did we do? We eliminated service. We cut salaries, pensions, and benefits. We merged with our competitors. No more little plastic wings for the kiddies; if you remember those, then you remember that the cheapest—and only--roundtrip coach fare from New York to Los Angeles in 1959 was about $1,800 in today's dollars. And if you remember that, then please stop whining about the fees.