Should only thin people fly then?

Jump to Last Post 1-7 of 7 discussions (20 posts)
  1. Silverspeeder profile image61
    Silverspeederposted 10 years ago

    After reading this article http://uk.finance.yahoo.com/news/why-ai … 03449.html i was wondering should airlines be offering larger seating for those who have to pay more?
    I believe it raises many questions and should other forms of public transport start charging people for their journeys by weight?
    Is it a question of discrimination or just plain business sense?

    1. wilderness profile image95
      wildernessposted 10 years agoin reply to this

      Not an easy question.  Is it "discrimination" to charge smokers more for health insurance?  To charge someone with 5 accidents this year more for car insurance?  To charge the same price for an airline seat for a 5 year old as an adult?  For a restaurant to charge more for an adult than a child?

      When prices charged reflect costs incurred it's pretty tough to claim discrimination, and increased weight most definitely increases airline costs just as adults eat more than children do in a restaurant.

      1. habee profile image93
        habeeposted 10 years agoin reply to this

        I agree.

      2. Silverspeeder profile image61
        Silverspeederposted 10 years agoin reply to this

        I am 6'3" tall and 280lbs i would not consider myself to be obese its just my natural build, my partner is 5'2" and 125lbs (she says). The world is made up of different sized people and i had to get down to a weight acceptable to what companies see as their ideal wouldn't it be a dangerous place?
        Would it be fair for instance if a taxi charged you double the fare because you were bigger than the average customer?
        If airlines want to charge more for bigger people then surely they should cater for them with bigger seats and larger leg room.

        1. IzzyM profile image87
          IzzyMposted 10 years agoin reply to this

          Taxis do charge more according to number of passengers. Only the first two are included in the basic fare, with extras added for the rest.
          When I was driving taxis, you knew when you were carrying fat passengers. You could feel the extra drag their weight put on the suspension.

          I often wished I could charge extra for weight, because I knew my fuel bill at the end of my shift was going to be higher because of the loads I had been carrying.

          I think this is a great idea and hope it catches on for all public transport.

          What a brilliant motivation for personal weight loss, as well as being fairer to slimmer passengers.

    2. moneyfairy profile image59
      moneyfairyposted 10 years agoin reply to this

      silverspeeder: I think if overweight passagers are to pay more that they should definitely have larger seats. I think it is really unfair to discriminate against a persons weight. What if the person is disabled and can't lose the weight because of health problems? What about pregnant woman? A huge portion of americans are large but not nessisarily obese. So what now? You have to be a size 0-2 (with no disabilities or health problems and weigh under 130lbs. or less???) in order to fit onto these plane seats? I for one think that the airlines will lose alot of money if they become sizest.

  2. Healthy Pursuits profile image81
    Healthy Pursuitsposted 10 years ago

    Wilderness, you covered it well. Just as if a child takes up a seat, which they should have for safety, If someone needs two seats, or a bigger seat, they should pay for it. A friend of many years is very overweight. She won't fly unless she has to, because she does need more than the average seat. However, she has no problem understanding that she pays for two seats.

    I don't think of that as discrimination. However, I do think that we are all treated in a pretty shabby way by the airlines these days.

  3. Sherry Hewins profile image93
    Sherry Hewinsposted 10 years ago

    I think all airline seats should be a bit bigger, I'm 130 pounds so I fit OK but it doesn't seem like you have to be morbidly obese before those seats are a bit tight.

    1. Zsuzsi profile image60
      Zsuzsiposted 10 years agoin reply to this

      I am lucky that I have average height and weight, but I always feel bad for those who are tall and have to squeeze into a tiny seat. They could be thin and still have problems when sitting in the same chair for hours.

  4. paradigmsearch profile image60
    paradigmsearchposted 10 years ago

    Just add a 10% disassembly/assembly fee and put the extra pieces in the overhead compartments.

  5. ocbill profile image53
    ocbillposted 10 years ago

    I think it is perfectly fine and acceptable. movers charge more to ship your stuff across country according to weight or how much space it occupies. The less weight or space you take up, the less cost.

    1. Silverspeeder profile image61
      Silverspeederposted 10 years agoin reply to this

      I think it's a dangerous game as airlines will see fat people as their cash cow and maybe even start to refuse thin people a seat if a fatty wants it!

      1. wilderness profile image95
        wildernessposted 10 years agoin reply to this

        If (IF) the additional price is the same as the additional cost then there would be no benefit to that.

        1. Silverspeeder profile image61
          Silverspeederposted 10 years agoin reply to this

          Flying fat people only could be seen as specialised travel and charged at a premium. Airline companies will never do anything unless items increased profits, charging people more because they are fat seems a good way of earning more money.

        2. Silverspeeder profile image61
          Silverspeederposted 10 years agoin reply to this

          Profits are calculated on maximum payload not minimum payloads therefor having a plane load of fat people only reduces the airlines profit it does not increase their costs.

  6. Maria Cecilia profile image84
    Maria Ceciliaposted 10 years ago

    This is making  me feel nervous and conscious of my weight,  so there are situation like this really...

  7. mistyhorizon2003 profile image88
    mistyhorizon2003posted 10 years ago

    I think it would a good idea if luggage allowances were increased proportionately for people who don't weigh much. It annoys me that as a slim woman I am still restricted to 20 kilos of luggage on our local airline (23 kilos in the UK) when I see extremely overweight people who have the same luggage allowance, yet it is obvious they weigh at least three times what I do. It would seem more fair for there to an 'overall' weight allowance that included your luggage, therefore larger people could either take less luggage, or pay the extra cost for taking more. Obviously if medical conditions were involved then those people could carry a doctor's certificate that gave them an exemption to this penalty.

    1. profile image0
      calculus-geometryposted 10 years agoin reply to this

      Passenger mass and baggage mass are handled differently, so it doesn't make sense to let light people have more bags to equal the weight of  a heavier passenger. When you pay baggage fees, you're paying for airport employees to lift the bags onto the cart, lift them off the cart, lift them into the plane, arrange them in the plane, take them off the plane, lift them onto the carousel, etc.  There's a lot of labor involved in moving bags, whereas passengers can (usually) move themselves.

      1. mistyhorizon2003 profile image88
        mistyhorizon2003posted 10 years agoin reply to this

        Interesting thoughts, although looking at how our baggage in the UK gets hurled all over the place by the baggage handlers does not seem to justify the costs (nearly always something gets broken, whether it is the suitcase itself or the contents, and this is on more than one airline). At least one of our local small airlines does distribute the passengers based on their size because the aircraft are light aircraft and this is important. There was a UK airline some years back that did work on the human weight costing, but from what I remember reading they stopped it because so many overweight people took it personally and behaved like they were being victimised (I wish I could recall which airline it was because I was only reading about it a month or so back). Must ask my friend about this as he is actually a flying instructor so I am sure he will have an opinion on the subject.

      2. moneyfairy profile image59
        moneyfairyposted 10 years agoin reply to this

        calculus-geometry: Loved your answer , it is so spot on!!!!

 
working

This website uses cookies

As a user in the EEA, your approval is needed on a few things. To provide a better website experience, hubpages.com uses cookies (and other similar technologies) and may collect, process, and share personal data. Please choose which areas of our service you consent to our doing so.

For more information on managing or withdrawing consents and how we handle data, visit our Privacy Policy at: https://corp.maven.io/privacy-policy

Show Details
Necessary
HubPages Device IDThis is used to identify particular browsers or devices when the access the service, and is used for security reasons.
LoginThis is necessary to sign in to the HubPages Service.
Google RecaptchaThis is used to prevent bots and spam. (Privacy Policy)
AkismetThis is used to detect comment spam. (Privacy Policy)
HubPages Google AnalyticsThis is used to provide data on traffic to our website, all personally identifyable data is anonymized. (Privacy Policy)
HubPages Traffic PixelThis is used to collect data on traffic to articles and other pages on our site. Unless you are signed in to a HubPages account, all personally identifiable information is anonymized.
Amazon Web ServicesThis is a cloud services platform that we used to host our service. (Privacy Policy)
CloudflareThis is a cloud CDN service that we use to efficiently deliver files required for our service to operate such as javascript, cascading style sheets, images, and videos. (Privacy Policy)
Google Hosted LibrariesJavascript software libraries such as jQuery are loaded at endpoints on the googleapis.com or gstatic.com domains, for performance and efficiency reasons. (Privacy Policy)
Features
Google Custom SearchThis is feature allows you to search the site. (Privacy Policy)
Google MapsSome articles have Google Maps embedded in them. (Privacy Policy)
Google ChartsThis is used to display charts and graphs on articles and the author center. (Privacy Policy)
Google AdSense Host APIThis service allows you to sign up for or associate a Google AdSense account with HubPages, so that you can earn money from ads on your articles. No data is shared unless you engage with this feature. (Privacy Policy)
Google YouTubeSome articles have YouTube videos embedded in them. (Privacy Policy)
VimeoSome articles have Vimeo videos embedded in them. (Privacy Policy)
PaypalThis is used for a registered author who enrolls in the HubPages Earnings program and requests to be paid via PayPal. No data is shared with Paypal unless you engage with this feature. (Privacy Policy)
Facebook LoginYou can use this to streamline signing up for, or signing in to your Hubpages account. No data is shared with Facebook unless you engage with this feature. (Privacy Policy)
MavenThis supports the Maven widget and search functionality. (Privacy Policy)
Marketing
Google AdSenseThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
Google DoubleClickGoogle provides ad serving technology and runs an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
Index ExchangeThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
SovrnThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
Facebook AdsThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
Amazon Unified Ad MarketplaceThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
AppNexusThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
OpenxThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
Rubicon ProjectThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
TripleLiftThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
Say MediaWe partner with Say Media to deliver ad campaigns on our sites. (Privacy Policy)
Remarketing PixelsWe may use remarketing pixels from advertising networks such as Google AdWords, Bing Ads, and Facebook in order to advertise the HubPages Service to people that have visited our sites.
Conversion Tracking PixelsWe may use conversion tracking pixels from advertising networks such as Google AdWords, Bing Ads, and Facebook in order to identify when an advertisement has successfully resulted in the desired action, such as signing up for the HubPages Service or publishing an article on the HubPages Service.
Statistics
Author Google AnalyticsThis is used to provide traffic data and reports to the authors of articles on the HubPages Service. (Privacy Policy)
ComscoreComScore is a media measurement and analytics company providing marketing data and analytics to enterprises, media and advertising agencies, and publishers. Non-consent will result in ComScore only processing obfuscated personal data. (Privacy Policy)
Amazon Tracking PixelSome articles display amazon products as part of the Amazon Affiliate program, this pixel provides traffic statistics for those products (Privacy Policy)
ClickscoThis is a data management platform studying reader behavior (Privacy Policy)