Is this the end of cheap Europe flights? France proposes EU-wide minimum price
Is this the end of cheap Europe flights? France proposes EU-wide minimum price
The French government announced that it hopes to bring in a minimum price for airline tickets to eliminate the possibility of cheap Europe flights.
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A major motivation for flying is it's faster and that will still be the case, so they'll still have plenty of customers, right? So if an airline can fly a route for 20 euros but the minimum price is, say 50 euros, won't the airline just pocket an extra 30 euros?
Why are flights cheaper that trains, anyway? According to the article and the linked Greenpeace research, trains are 2-10 more expensive (and take longer) because of extra taxes that the airlines don't pay. So, instead of a minimum price, how about we address the root of the problem and either tax the airlines more or tax the trains less?
Maybe in addition to removing some exemptions, we add a pollution tax too (or maybe just raise the fuel tax)? Taxes have been used to motivate the market for a long time, so if we make it expensive enough to pollute, then it will motivate r&d to develop less polluting aircraft. In fact, hydrogen fueled aircraft are already being pursued: https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/hydrogen-aircraft-developers-are-long-haul-2023-02-09/
In my opinion, France's proposal is like using a sledgehammer to drive a nail.
Let's just introduce a Shinkansen style bullet train network.
Can't travel much faster on land without killing anyone.just
With the best of intentions.
Obviously introducing a whole new railroad network is a whole task in of itself (see Stuttgart21).
Now make it accommodate a bullet train is even another issue.Fun fact:Stuttgart21 will service less trains than before https://wikireal.info/wiki/Stuttgart_21/Leistung#Fehler_in_den_bisherigen_Gutachten_.E2.80.93_was_bleibt.2C_sind_32_Z.C3.BCge
It is basically just a big real estate project as it frees up expensive space in the city centre.
there are a lot of flights between cities where Train is just as fast if you factor in how early you have to be at the airport and that you also need to grab your luggage after landing
but yeah I also read an opinion-piece some time ago how there should be an option to apply for additional holiday-days if you are going on holiday by train and spend 12+ hours on a train for that instead of taking the flight-option