[masraum]

I'm pretty sure that what's more important for planes/flying than "how many bodies are on board" is "how much weight am I hauling." The pilot, plane, physics, doesn't care if it's a bunch of anorexics or fat people or 1000 chihuahuas or stacks of gold bars. All that matters is "how much is it and is it appropriately distributed throughout the plane." So, it's not like we're really paying for 1 person to fly. We're paying for an average person to fly. If you are so far out of average that you're an outlier (you're the equivalent of 3-5 average people) then you need to pay more. Where that breaks down is with tiny people like kids and babies, because the plane also has limitations on how people can be distributed based on the seats. And planes are happy to make a little extra on a baby to make up for the big folks that they get stuck with.

Many years ago when flying between Florida and Japan, we landed in Denver. I think we were on a 747. We taxied a long time. We taxied over freeways which was unusual. The pilot came on and said something like, "you may have noticed that we've been taxiing for a while. The flight is very full of people and luggage and a full load of fuel, so we are going to the end of the longest runway to ensure we've got enough space to get enough speed to be able to take off." My mom was about ready to volunteer to lighten the load, LOL. I think I was 10 and thought it was pretty cool.