@whitequark and removing a row of business gets you a lot closer to the next-size-smaller plane (with lighter fuselage, lower fuel burn per mile, etc) than removing a row of economy, and it also potentially allows you to fly more people on the same fuselage by adding more economy, which reduces the per-passenger fuel burn…

@rcombs hm, is it actually the case that smaller planes have lower fuel burn per mile? that doesn't make sense to me. why even have big planes if so

@mcc @rcombs the comparison in this thread is inherently "per passenger"

@mcc @rcombs like it can't both be true that going to a bigger plane reduces per-passenger fuel burn, and also going to a smaller plane does.

@whitequark @mcc I mean, if the counterfactuals are "fly 2 planes" and "fly the big plane half-empty" respectively, then they absolutely can both be true, just in different situations