Airfares were once out of normal people's reach, but some years ago, the airplane industry saw a revolution where airfares started to get cheaper. This made the airplanes much more commonly used than before, but then came covid 19. If someone asked me if few years that, "What if the world gets closed or you could not travel from one country to another" I would not believe it the same way as no one believed that covid 19 would be that dangerous. But it proved to be the worst infection of this generation and one of the most dangerous infections ever happening in the world.
In 2020, when Covid 19 struck, it brought not only our lives to a standstill but also some of the industries. One of the industries most affected by this pandemic was the airplane industry, as inter-country travel was completely banned. Even big airlines like Delta flights and JetBlue flights were suffering admits the pandemic.
The airplane industry is the sector it was hit very badly by covid 19. Due to the restrictions of covid 29, airplanes were banned for a year or two, which was already a big stumbling block for the country's growth. But the recent attack on Ukraine by Russia has caused the fuel prices to skyrocket.
Currently, fuel prices have been at an all-time high in the last decade or so. While during 2019, the fuel costs amounted to 27% of an average airline's cost, after the Russian invasion, that 27% has increased to 38%. Some fuel costs have become up to 50% of the airline's average cost.
Some American investors have claimed that the airlines have to impose fuel charges to cope with this situation. Most US-based airlines have been able to regulate the prices by increasing the fare charges of the customers.
There are generally two types of people after the end of the pandemic. One who cannot afford to buy airfares due to an unstable financial condition was caused by the pandemic. Then there is another group of people who are termed as "revenge travelers" these are the people who either had a plan of going on a vacation, but it was cancelled due to the pandemic, or someone who normally craved to going on a tour.
The revenge travelers had a lot of money as they saved for going on a trip once the pandemic was completely over. So, two be clear, there was a group of people who were not financially stable and a group who had saved funds for travel. So, for the airlines, the decisions were easy: they had to increase the fare prices to cover up their losses from the revenge travelers.
One thing to note is that these revenge travelers were so desperate that some were even booking costly airfares, which they would not have normally done. If you want to know the best time to buy airline tickets for January 2023, you should start looking for ticket booking from the last quarter of 2022 (October, November, and December).
Millions of people have lost they're in the world in all sectors, but the airplane sector also lost hundreds of thousands of workers. But now, when the pandemic seems to be ending, all the regulations have been taken back, so they are ready to operate normally, but they are not coming up with the new influx of people who want to travel after being trapped for two years in their houses. The airlines could not match the speed of their work with the speed of hiring quality labor.
For example, it was reported that Singapore's Changi Airport (considered one of the best in the world) needed to hire 6600 workers. After losing their jobs due to the pandemic, they had to switch careers which saw them switching to less volatile careers.
It was also reported that they offered a joining bonus of S$25,000 to auxiliary police. The shocking fact is that the job of auxiliary police saw an average monthly salary of around S$3700.
Due to the pandemic, the airlines were facing losses of millions of dollars. This was because, at that time, the airplane was completely banned. This was when the airlines had to fire many employees to cut losses. Even after the regulations were taken back by the government in the second half of 2021, all the airlines were still facing losses.
It was predicted that the airlines would take the 2nd half of 2022 to make profits. But the main stumbling block was that the demand for air travel is a lot, but they are not able to meet the demands as they don’t have enough staff or planes in general. This is why airlines are increasing the prices of their airfares to decrease their losses and move ahead toward making a profit.
If you have a question like "will flight prices go down" then let me clear out that yes, it would. As we already mentioned, it is predicted that the major airlines will start making profits in the second half of the year, starting from June.
But this is a prediction, and there is a big difference between prediction and reality. There is no assurance of when the prices of flight fares will come down, but it is expected that once the airlines start making a profit, they will lower the prices of airfares for good.
The cost of flying has risen recently, but this has not stopped people from going on international vacations. Not only has the pandemic had its effects on the airplane industry also the recent Russian invasion of Ukraine has been taking a large toll.
To tackle this situation, most airlines have to increase flight rates. Airfare in 2022 is not even close to what it was in 2019, that is, before the pandemic. If you still want to get lower prices for your ticket, then you need to make airline reservations beforehand.
