Are airlines trying to scare us into business class?

I’m a tall European guy, so while I usually don’t need a lot of space in terms of seat width, I do desperately need leg room. Airlines are the prime example of why working efficiently and optimizing everything to the full 100% is not always a good idea. On my tour through Asia I learned the hard way Asian planes are typically not built for anyone suffering from tall genes – and trust me they made me suffer. Especially the local, cheaper airlines left me with precisely zero legroom. Actually, the person in front of me probably got more familiar with my knees than they cared for. I’m deeply sorry. Then again, what you pay is usually what you get, so when booking price-fighting local Asian airlines to do some island hopping in the Philippines I could have seen that coming.

What I didn’t see coming was the new design on Boeing – somehow they thought it was a good idea to cram another seat in almost every row of the already full plane. From the standard 2-4-2 configuration on the larger pla…