This is plane insanity!
Common sense is in short supply during the holidays — just ask the cargo cultists
Have travelers lost their minds?
I'm not even talking about the omicron hype, which is making many people rethink their upcoming travel plans (we had a wild discussion about that on Friday). Omicron, a possibly more infectious COVID variant, is still being studied by scientists. Early reports say the symptoms are milder than other variants and that people who have been vaccinated are somewhat protected.
But readers are still asking me if they should cancel their Christmas vacations or spring break trips.
My answer: Whoah, there! It's way too early to know if this thing will be a problem in a few weeks or months.
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But no, when I talk about losing our minds, I'm also thinking of the craziness I've seen during my travels in the last month. And there's a lot of crazy.
Are you a plane worshipper?
Whenever the subject of travel comes up, people automatically assume we're talking about air travel. (See, I'm doing it right now.) But as I've said repeatedly, more than 90 percent of Americans get to their destination by car, a number that has remained fairly consistent for many years.
Some people find it difficult to think about air travel rationally. They assign a special, almost cult-like value not just to planes, but also to airport waiting areas, airline seats and loyalty programs. Common sense goes out the cabin door. The result is a dangerously distorted and dumbed-down view of travel.
Here are the ways people have lost their minds:
Airport lounges
I recently wrote a story about airport lounges for one of my mainstream media outlets. As part of my research, I visited one of the major lounges in San Francisco. Nice place, with a lunch buffet, "free" drinks and comfortable furniture. People spend hundreds of dollars a year on credit cards that give them access to these facilities. Bloggers post glam shots of the lounges as if they were inside a medieval cathedral.
But what would happen to these lounges if you took them out of the airport? They'd be little more than an all-you-can-eat buffet in a strip mall that you'd take your favorite aunt to on her birthday. Would you spend $695 a year so that you could eat at the Golden Corral a few times? No, you would not.
Business class
The plane worship becomes more devout as you near the front of the aircraft. You've probably seen the online influencers with their videos of flying in first class. Oh, the champagne! The service! But they are behaving like a distant offshoot of the South Pacific Cargo Cult. They expect you to accept the bizarre idea that it's worth spending thousands of extra dollars for a slightly bigger seat on the plane with a few additional creature comforts.
But take that same lie-flat seat off a plane and put it anywhere else — on a bus, a train, a car — and it loses much of its appeal. In your living room, it just becomes grandpa's easy chair, which you might pay a small premium for at La-Z-Boy, but not the premium prices the airlines command for spending a few hours in it. And certainly not the lifetime of mindless obedience to a loyalty program.
Loyalty programs
You already know how I feel about loyalty programs (because I just told you). But let's stay there for a moment.
Remove the loyalty program from the plane and what do you get? The flimsy metal cards shed almost all of their value. Imagine the tortured logic of an airline running the Starbucks loyalty program. How to duplicate the success of luggage fees? You know, taking away something that was once included in the product and then either reselling it to you or forcing you to join the loyalty program to get it "free." Perhaps they would start charging extra for cups (unbundling, they would call it). Then they would offer their rewards members "free" cups when they order coffee. All others must pay a 50 cent surcharge.
No, that wouldn't fly.
Airline loyalty programs specialize in taking money from you and giving you a uniformly substandard customer experience. They could not survive in the real world.
Food
Finally, there is food — both airport and airline food. A lot of it is inedible or overpriced, or both. Airport food generally ranges from so-so to absolutely horrible. And you should never even touch the stuff they try to sell you in economy class. If you want to step off the plane weighing another 10 pounds, feel free to eat the meals they serve in the premium seats.
What if you took the costly airport food and the unpalatable airline meals away from the airport? Well, you could start an airline food restaurant. You would be out of business in a day. But somehow, we not only tolerate these culinary sins, but when someone puts in a minimal effort, the online influencers hover over them with their cameras, writing about the reincarnation of Julia Child. Come on.
Don't lose your mind, please
Now, I realize there are some good people reading this who will say, "But Chris, I love my points and I fly all over the place for free!" Others will react more angrily. One loyalty program blogger recently emailed me, proudly declaring he would "fight to the death" to defend loyalty programs. If that doesn't sound like a religion, then I don't know what does.
But think about it. How much money have you mindlessly spent on tickets or lounge access without even considering the logic of it all? Maybe we've all engaged in a little plane worship.
I know I have.
When I write my book about the death of common sense, I will have to devote a chapter or two to airlines and airports. We're not just overreacting to a new COVID variant. Reason itself is going out the window when it comes to this unpopular and overpublicized mode of transportation.
Can I hear an "amen"?
How to not lose your mind when you travel
It's a fact: Common sense is in short supply these days. But here are a few ways to make sure you don't become a sucker.
Don't follow the crowd. You've heard of the wisdom of the crowd. It doesn't always apply to consumer products, and it definitely doesn't apply to air travel. When they zig, you should zag.
Beware of self-styled experts. I've heard some of the worst advice from self-described experts, thought leaders and influencers. The recommendations they give you are often self-serving — and wrong. I could name names, but they don't deserve the publicity.
If something feels off, remember Elliott's Displacement Rule. Try asking yourself how this would look if it were happening away from the airport (or hotel or anywhere). For example, would it make sense to you if your restaurant charged you extra to skip to the front of the line or added a $7,500 surcharge for a more comfortable seat? Yeah, crazy.
Your turn. How do you think travelers have lost their minds? Or then again, maybe I've lost my mind (always a possibility)? It's comment time.
About the art
For this piece, artist Dustin Elliott drew from Vanuatu's Cargo Cult — the real plane worshippers — as well as his own experience of growing up in a deeply religious home. "Just a fun mix, if you ask me," he says. Tell me about it!
We have mostly given up on frequent flyer programs. What they don't advertise is that they can devalue your points at the click of a mouse. The ticket that was available yesterday is now more points. We have switched to cash back credit cards and careful shopping for fares. A dollar rebate can be used towards a trip or it can be used to buy groceries and cash doesn't expire. We have an Amazon card that gives us 5% back for every Amazon purchase. It shows up as a credit every month. We get cash back from Costco every year. Same from American Express. No fees on any of the cards. Interest rates range from high to usurious, but we pay the cards off every month. It works for us.
I agree with most of what you say. The distinction I draw is for long flights, i.e. Trans Pacific or Asia to Europe. I am also older (70s) and recall pre-jet-power flight and when most people behaved civilly to each other. Meals were a little rough but what does one expect to come out of the galley of an Electra. Now I too have back problems and so fly business when before I wouldn't have. I am also very careful of the airline and nationality of the flag - that can make a huge difference. I try very hard to stay off US carriers though that's pretty tough flying in and out of airports in the US unless you live in a gateway city (Air Canada sometimes is an option on one route I fly). But the saddest thing to me is the obvious disdain for their passengers I increasingly notice from airline Boards and Directors. They seem to be increasingly disconnected from their passengers, are blinded by the "shareholder value is everything - cost cut" business model, despise their employees and must spend their days with their heads and brains in data analysis (not that one can't learn from data - but that is not the whole story). They make seats smaller and smaller and jam planes fuller and fuller and expect happy customers? Did we not have "rat lab" studies of overcrowding in US University Psych Departments in the 1930s? One might hope that some of these guilded executives might have learned from Boeing's experience with the 737 Max 8 (that was in part all cost driven) as well as the current culture. That wasn't just uncomfortable seating or bad service. They killed almost 400 people. Then there was United's famous experience with Dr. David Dao (organization culture) or the inability (unwillingness) of some airlines to interline baggage - even within their own affiliated groups. But things go both ways. If even a small minority of people feel the right to physically or even verbally assault cabin or ground staff over some perceived political trifle, well then they probably shouldn't expect too much respect from the C suite.