Tracking 30 years of falling airline ticket prices

"Ultimately the flying consumer sets the value for this whole chain."

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“It’s your fault. If you would just pay more for your airline ticket, it would relieve this situation.”

The tongue-in-cheek reply was to question posed to then-Chief Executive of Spirit AeroSystems, Jeff Turner about the underlying dynamics were behind the squeeze on the aerospace manufacturing supply chain. Spirit in 2012 was feeling it acutely having survived – along with dozens of others – through the most costly (subsonic) commercial aircraft development program in history.

“The real issue is the fundamental economics of the flying public,” said Turner. “The flying public is very specific about what they’re willing to pay, in general, to get from Point A to Point B. It’s very trackable. It starts the process.”

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Jon Ostrower
Jon Ostrower is Editor-in-chief of The Air Current, where he leads coverage of the global aerospace and aviation industries. Prior to launching TAC in June 2018, Mr. Ostrower served as Aviation Editor for CNN Worldwide, guiding the network’s global coverage of the business and operations of aviation. Mr. Ostrower joined CNN in 2016 following four and a half years at the Wall Street Journal. Based first in Chicago and then in Washington, D.C., he covered Boeing, aviation safety, and the business of global aerospace. Before that, Mr. Ostrower was editor of FlightBlogger for Flightglobal and Flight International Magazine covering the development of the Boeing 787 Dreamliner and other new aircraft programs from 2007 to 2012. He is also an instructor at the University of Southern California in the Viterbi School of Engineering's Aviation Safety and Security program. Mr. Ostrower, a Boston native, graduated from The George Washington University’s School of Media and Public Affairs with a bachelor’s degree in Political Communication. He is based in Seattle.
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