On flying

Are there any other markets besides for stocks where the prices fluctuate so rapidly and wildly as they do in the airline market?

We're flying this Thanksgiving. Normally we go out around Christmas, when days are more flexible, but my brother is getting married in January, so we're going out for Thanksgiving instead... because my 10-year high school reunion is that Saturday. >.>

Anyway, we've been watching airline prices for several weeks now, and they're just all over the place. We've been looking at alternate days, alternate airports, alternate airlines. And all in all, there's just no rhyme or reason to the price fluctuations. One day tickets on a flight are $350; they next they're $500. Fly on Tuesday or Thursday, and the prices are different.

Would people be more likely to fly if doing so were at a predictable cost? If someone knew that it was always going to be $350 to go fly to see Grandma, would they be more likely to go see Grandma than if, when he's thinking about it and go check flights, they're $715, rather than $400 the next morning? How many sales do airlines lose because their pricing is so unpredictable?

Apparently not enough that they've changed the system.

Or some kind of predictable scaling system - book in January for a flight in June, and you pay $250. Book in March and it's $300. Book in May and it's $400. That would at least make sense if the seats were filling up. When it asked me to pick seats for the flights I booked today, the website was all, "Only 2 seats left at this price!" And then maybe 7 seats on the plane are taken when I go to pick them. Huh?

So, yeah, I booked flights today. Now I just need to actually get the invitation to the reunion. >.>