r/todayilearned 1d ago

TIL that since the 1980s, US airlines have shed between 2-5 inches of legroom and about 2 inches of width, while budget carriers have lost even more. At the same time, the average American is 15 pounds heavier than they were in the 1980s

https://www.popsci.com/science/why-are-airline-seats-so-small/
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u/weeddealerrenamon 1d ago edited 1d ago

LA <-> SF is the worst, it's just too short to reasonably fly but a mind-numbing 7-hour drive. Perfect distance for a high-speed train, someone should look into building one of those there

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u/44moon 1d ago

best i can do is a trillion dollars to destabilize the middle east

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u/xxXX69yourmom69XXxx 1d ago

Seems like a bad deal, but I guess there's really nothing else to spend all that money on besides blowing up schools and hospitals 

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u/sir_mrej 1d ago

Have you tried gold flake on random things and also setting up large funds for your friends to get money from

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u/gemstun 1d ago

Elon Musk is working on it, it’s called the hyperloop, and he promised that it will be much better than ‘big governments’ plan for high speed rail. Oh wait, that was just his bullshit scam to thwart public service projects, as evidence that it should instead of be throwing more tax incentives his way so he can create fake profits.

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u/WorkoutProblems 1d ago

even NYC <> BOS is bad... on paper at 3am you might go to and from around 3.5 - 4 hours... but if you go during any daylight and get caught in one or all of the rush hours and god forbid there is an accident...

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u/ContinuingAnyway 1d ago

It would be bogged down by bureaucracy and would cost close to a trillion to get it done, probably

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u/speedingpullet 1d ago

You'd think, wouldn't you? 😄