Growth in freight on all-cargo flights swings about five times wider than the economy's. This compares how much each moves; it is not an estimate of how freight responds to the economy.
What this shows: The chart covers 1991 Q1 to 2025 Q3. It plots Freight ton-miles, year-over-year change (%) and GDP, year-over-year change (%) on a vertical axis of Year-over-year growth (%). Latest values: Freight ton-miles, year-over-year change (%) -7.2; GDP, year-over-year change (%) 2.3. Data run through 2025 Q3.
Conditions and method
Status: descriptive (a pattern in the data, not a causal estimate).
The freight series is ton-miles of freight and mail on all-cargo flights (aircraft with no seats). Freight carried in the holds of passenger aircraft is not in it, so the chart describes all-cargo flying and not air freight as a whole; a change in it can also reflect freight moving between all-cargo and passenger aircraft.
T-100 did not cover domestic all-cargo flying, FedEx included, before 2002 Q4.