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Comment by evanagon | Hacker News Reader

There are financial incentives if their customers choose competing products because of safety concerns.

I don't even know how I'd do that - even if I tried to book a flight that specifically didn't use a boeing plane in the US domestic airlines will swap out planes for different ones all the time due to maintenance requirements.

Choosing to use a competing product as an end consumer would require an immense sacrifice (like refusing to board your flight if it happened to be a Boeing, which you might get a rebate for?). Only if a significant amount of end consumers protested would the actual plane consumers (the airlines themselves) take notice - or if public opinion shifted to the point where there was a significant externality attached to purchasing a Boeing plane, but that certainly isn't the case now and I'd bet that Boeing has found some way to compensate airlines for the cost of having their planes grounded.

If airlines have to pay more in insurance premiums or they have to pay millions of US dollars a pop for each dead passenger, they'll demand a safer plane.

To my knowledge neither of these conditions have occurred in response to the 737 Max technical issues. Corporations listen to customer complaints that are backed up by losing revenue - as was shown with the issue where a passenger was beaten up on a United flight, people are extremely price sensitive when it comes to flying - there is math that can make the 737 unprofitable, but I think it's unlikely that the math will turn in that direction, it would take an extremely negative PR issue to start this.

I dont think people will all of a sudden start ditching cheap flights just to avoid the max or Boeing. Airline industry is extremely price sensitive from a consumer perspective, and for people to potentially sacrifice hundreds of dollars of savings would be a non sequitur.

For example, if airline A flies MAX and has a ticket for 200 and another airline B has the same route for 400 on A320, most people I know would still fly the MAX because they cant afford to be picky.

I think talking with your wallet works only when the price is relatively inelastic

The assumption here is that the risk is equal. Given that prior to the grounding travel Sites were implementing "don't fly with Max" features, the perception is that the rusk is much higher.

Here is one data point for you: no matter the price of alternatives, I will not step on a 737. Ever.

You have already, probably multiple times. The 737 model is proven over 50 years of service.

The Max has issues, for sure, and I will be weary of that as well as the upcoming 777X, but I wouldn't hesitate to get on any prior 737 or other Boeing model.

If you purchase a plane ticket for a flight that appears to be carried by a bombardier model, would you refuse to board the plane at the gate if the bombardier plane ended up requiring maintenance and they swapped it out for a 737?

How many vacation days would you sacrifice out of your week in Cancun to stand by that belief?

The 737s are the most common airliner in the world, more than 10000 have been built, and more than 1000 are in the air right now. The pre-MAX 737s are just fine (though it had some issues with the rudder in the 90s, and, well, nearly 2% of all 737s built have been lost (184 hull losses) with nearly 5000 fatalities. Goes to show how much they fly.)

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