The End of Cheap Travel. Airline Tickets Are Getting More Expensive

The era of cheap flights is slowly becoming a thing of the past, and passengers must prepare for an increase in airfare prices. It seems that airlines are ending their current low-price policy, and their increase will be justified by ecological issues.
Those who were expecting cheap flights to popular destinations may be disappointed. The trend of price reductions that has dominated in recent years seems to be reversing, and future travel will be associated with higher costs. Experts indicate that one of the main reasons for this change is environmental requirements.
Airline ticket prices are rising
Bankier.pl reports that according to the International Air Transport Association (IATA), ticket prices will increase because airlines are increasingly abandoning the inclusion of additional services in the ticket, which were previously standard. As a result, passengers will have to bear higher costs, which is a consequence of the growing expenses related to the ecological transformation in the aviation industry.
According to the data cited by the aforementioned portal, in 2019 the average price of a round-trip ticket was $317 (excluding additional fees and taxes), while in 2023 it dropped to $254. However, this trend, which is beneficial for passengers, will not last long, as carriers are planning price increases. They attribute this not only to inflation, but also to the end of market support after the COVID-19 pandemic and the impact of environmental regulations of the European Union.
Additional charges for passenger flights
For example, Lufthansa has introduced an additional fee of 1 to 72 euros to cover the costs of environmental regulations. In addition, on long-haul routes it has started charging a fee for seat selection, something that was previously typical only for low-cost airlines. Other airlines, such as Air France-KLM, Wizz Air and Brussels Airlines, have introduced similar fees. Experts point out that carriers may be charging higher fees than the real environmental costs.
According to IATA calculations, cited by Bankier.pl, airlines earn an average of $6.14 per passenger, which contributes to the industry’s record revenue of $1 trillion. After deducting taxes and operating costs, the carriers’ projected profit is expected to be around $30 billion. Experts warn that customers can expect an increasingly detailed breakdown of ticket costs, but airlines may not always rightly justify higher prices with the need to cover expenses related to environmental protection.