Who makes money flying planes?

Every chart on this question

• BR Brazil: fuel intensity (litres per departure)

  Comparing full years, fuel burned per departure on Brazilian airlines has risen by about a quarter since the turn of the century, ending at its record high.

• CA Canada: airline revenue and expenses (Level I-II)

  Canadian airline revenues have nearly doubled in dollar terms in just over a decade, with the COVID slump a deep but temporary interruption.

• CN China: airline-segment revenue & profit (¥bn)

  China's airlines were profitable until COVID, then posted deep losses through the pandemic and a small one the year after, before returning to a thin profit.

• US Available seat-mile growth by carrier type, year over year

  Low-cost carriers grew capacity by more than ten percent a year in most years from the mid-nineties to the late two-thousands but have recently been shrinking, while legacy carriers grow.

• US Cost per available seat-mile (CASM) by carrier type

  Low-cost carriers' unit-cost advantage over legacy airlines has persisted for three decades, and it has widened.

• US Cost per available seat-mile: fuel vs non-fuel

  Fuel is the volatile part of airline unit costs, but non-fuel costs make up the bulk and keep rising.

• US Fuel is the volatile band; distribution costs collapsed

  Over three decades fuel is the band that swings, while the cost of selling a ticket shrinks from a fifth of the bill to a twentieth.

• US Recession margin impact

  In each of the three recessions shown, airline unit margins went from positive to negative, and the pandemic collapse ran several times deeper than either earlier downturn.

• US Industry average yield

  Average revenue per passenger-mile over thirty years, with visible dips after the September attacks, the financial crisis and COVID.

• US Yield vs load factor by decade

  From the nineties to the twenty-tens each decade's cloud sits further right, as planes filled up. The clouds rise far less, in cents per passenger-mile, and the pandemic scatters the latest one.

• IN India: active scheduled domestic carriers

  India has fewer active scheduled domestic airlines than a decade ago. The count peaked in the late twenty-tens and is now at its lowest; the chart does not show why any airline left.

• IN India: carrier market share, legacy vs low-cost carriers

  Low-cost carriers flew about two-fifths of India's domestic passengers a decade and a half ago and now carry roughly seven in ten.

• KR South Korea: market share among Korean airlines

  Korean Air and Asiana once carried every passenger flown by Korean airlines; low-cost carriers now hold a share rivalling both legacy airlines combined.

• US Legacy to low-cost carrier yield ratio

  The ratio of legacy carriers' average yield to low-cost carriers', by quarter and as a rolling average. Both lines end at their highest: legacy carriers now earn about half as much again per mile.

• US Legacy tickets average 1.7 times the low-cost carrier fare, about $100 more

  Since the start of the pandemic the dollar gap between legacy and low-cost fares has widened, while the ratio of the two has narrowed slightly.