Following the Airlines’ Lead

There are some issues with the description of airline fees here. Since deregulation, airfares in the US have been plummeting -- a ticket now costs as little as 10% of what it used to (adjusted for inflation). There are two ways to accomplish that: one is to make major efficiency breakthroughs which reduce the cost of operating, and the other is to reduce the level of service.

For the most part, there haven't been enough major efficiency gains to reduce operational cost at the same rate as fares. So for a while now, fares have been reduced through unbundling and a-la-carte fees.

And though people love to gripe and complain about being charged a fee for a checked bag, or being charged for food and drink on the flight, being charged to talk to a live agent instead of using a computer kiosk, etc., there has been no "vote with your wallet" response that would encourage airlines to continue offering a higher fare which bundles all those things into the cost. Most people simply type their starting point, destination, and some dates into a travel search engine and pick the lowest fare that comes up, without realizing the true cost of the "cheap" fare.

This is not to say that airlines haven't taken advantage of this to introduce fees for things that don't directly relate to their operating costs -- several, for example, will happily upsell you at check-in to a package which includes a priority security line, for example, even though the speed of the security line has no effect on how much the airline pays to operate the flight -- but it is the explanation for the majority of the things people complain about.