RichardKennaway comments on [QUESTION]: What are your views on climate change, and how did you form them? - Less Wrong

5 Post author: VipulNaik 08 July 2014 02:52PM

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Comment author: [deleted] 18 July 2014 09:28:49AM 0 points [-]

Commercial aviation is just barely economically viable today, and fuel getting much more expensive would it make all but impossible for airlines to make any net profit. But yeah, this might change in the future.

Comment author: RichardKennaway 18 July 2014 05:13:10PM 0 points [-]

Commercial aviation is just barely economically viable today

[citation needed]

Comment author: gwern 18 July 2014 11:01:47PM 3 points [-]

It's pretty notorious. Airlines routinely go bankrupt and prompt articles like "The Economist explains: Why airlines make such meagre profits"

Despite incredible growth, airlines have not come close to returning the cost of capital, with profit margins of less than 1% on average over that period. In 2012 they made profits of only $4 for every passenger carried. Why has a booming business failed to prosper?

army1987's point is ill-posed and makes little sense in a supply-demand framework - the more interesting question is how much ticket prices would have to rise if fuel got much more expensive, since obviously they would rise & airlines wouldn't simply stop flying entirely.