DXB2745

Is it traditionally very expensive to fly on Election Night in America to America?

There are crazy prizes showing for Nov 5th to JFK (although going the day before is cheaper) and the couple of days after are also very high.

PAL62V

Not sure about flying in, but depending on the result there may be a huge demand on leaving America on the 6th.

Blumie

This may surprise others, but there’s a shocking number of Americans who don’t have passports. I was dating one when Donald Trump was elected. The next day I made her get her passport application in. (She has since been to Abu Dhabi, Dubai and London.)

bobnchi

Sad but true. And many of those haven't been out of their state or even their county! One of the many things I shake my head at about where I live.

LapLap

Back in 2004 (the bmi days) it couldn’t have been so expensive as I flew to New York that day with UA, but it was an indirect flight. I arrived at Washington in the election’s aftermath and there was an eeriness to the airport.

The small plane to New York was completely full and the valiant flight crew was doing his absolute best to remain upbeat and chipper during the flight. We made a lot of eye contact and I sent him lots of smiles because the plane was otherwise entirely filled with morose, sullen people. The despair for Kerry having lost the election was palpable, it flooded the cabin and became a molasses through which the FA had to distribute cups of water. I was glad to be there to give him some moral support.

heronb

I’ll be on a transatlantic cruise from Europe into Miami during the vote, which I imagine will be populated with US citizens of a certain age, not my best travel plan.

muscat

Alternatively,
Is it traditionally very expensive to fly on Guy Fawkes’ Night in Britain to America?

dougzz

But how many, particularly northern, Europeans get passports simply to travel to a sunny destination for a holiday. US citizens can do that without a passport. How many French citizens have passports, less than half I believe, whilst a much smaller country than the US they possess sun and snow, the main reasons people travel for holidays. As with any statistic context is always important.

irishguy28

Northern Europeans can travel to a sunny destination without a passport, too.

RichieMc

Pew says 56% of US adults have passports. And 27% of people have never left the country. Neither of these seems particularly shocking. Plenty of Brits travelling consists of drinking holidays to Shagaluf. The US is big and Americans could do the equivalent in Daytona Beach or South Padre without need for passport. And I imagine there are loads of people in say Puglia who have never left southern Italy.

CT-UK

Indeed, and cold wet places as well.. Ferry services to the UK over the winter have been desimated due to students not being able to come to the UK to learn English, now Ireland has benefited hugely from this.

Cheapskate22

At school, I had a class taught by Condoleezza Rice. The one thing that stuck with me, was that 95% of the world’s population never go further than 25 miles from where they were born.

Our wealthy European/North American perspective of the world as a small, easily traveled place is very much the minority perspective.

Stripe

Makes no sense to me. There is really no reason for fares to be expensive on election day. It's a Tuesday, which tends to have lower fares anyway and I can't think of why anyone booking this far out would be traveling specifically due to the election. On election night in 1988 my (soon to be) wife and I flew from NY to DFW to get married the following weekend. Those were the good old days when you had to vote in person on the day of the election, so we had to take care of that before leaving.

The flight was on People Express and I recall the pilot announcing mid flight that the election had been called for Bush.

TxDucky

Pews numbers seem off. If you look at statistics over time (State Department reporting), the number was in a relatively steepish climb for a while.In 1989, only about 4% of Americans had passports, and it had climbed pretty steadily to 17% by 1999, where it leveled for nearly two years. The climb then resumed, and jumped in 2007-2009 and again in 2016-2017. By 2017 the numbers were up to 42%, while it’s seems to be 48% now (as the State Department itself says 48% in a December 18, 2023 news release reporting reduced processing times).

Perhaps Pew is adding Passport Card holders to the mix, a National ID Card that allows travel to Mexico, Canada, Bermuda and some Caribbean nations by land or sea, not air. The Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative was what drove the 2007 spike, as a Passport, Passport Card or certain other ID was then officially a requirement for Mexico, Canada and a number of cruises. Basically, until 2001+, most Americans could travel the entire North American continent without a passport, needing just a photo ID like a simple drivers license. The second spike is likely related to the initial REAL ID requirement rollout, a requirement for air travel that has been delayed quite a bit.

djp98374

a few days after…….prices will be very high because Veterans Day nov 11, a fed holiday, is on a Monday which will make 3 day weekends possible.



the evening of Election Day…I’m thinking you might have network press and staff traveling to nyc for evening election coverage.

with many states having early voting options in October you might not have as much surge of voting on the 5th. Because of early voting mechanisms like mail in or drop in voting you are likely not going to have anything decided till Saturday after….so folks aren’t escaping.

I do not know if the Federal Reserve has its meetings in nyc….but Nov 6-7 they have a meeting…if it’s in nyc you have many coming into nyc.

november 3 is the nyc marathon

therr can be other meetings/ conventions occuring in nyc nov 6-8 period