The highest fees are for extra or overweight bags and for any sort of non-Internet customer service purchase or ticket change, which of course hurts lower-income Americans stuck on the wrong side of the digital divide. Without access to the Internet they are forced to pay more.

The column points out what everyone knows-- that nearly all airlines now charge cattle-class customers for the mysterious cardboard boxes of "food." The column predicts new fees for checking bags, growth in airlines charging fees for aisle seats and a return to a so-far failed experiment in charging for soda.

It's true that the airlines have adopted their "a la carte" pricing scheme for "extras" from the banks (the banks charge for everything except breathing their air) and telephone companies (look at your bill, you have a pay phone in your home).

But the airlines are the longtime pioneers of discriminatory pricing for their basic product-- seats. Where else can you find a product where everyone pays a different price for the same service--getting from here to there? (I am not talking the obvious first class vs. cattle class. Ask the people squashed next to you in cattle class what they paid for their tickets.)

In the general case, charging less for advance tickets fills planes and may benefit everyone, even including last-minute travelers who pay more, because besides filling seats to aid profitability it probably helps put more planes in the air, meaning more seats. And the two products-- a 3-week excursion ticket vs. a last-minute business ticket, can be considered differentiated. But the airlines are pushing the envelope with their grab-bag of new nuisance fees, especially when collecting money here and there slows service and lowers the "quality" of the "in-flight experience," especially when you're experiencing a seatback in your face. (Riding economy is kind of like a comedy bit I saw a few years on TV about riding in an old VW bug, except in an old VW bug, you could at least see through the windshield squashed up against your face.)

Watch closely as price discrimination spreads to other sectors. Is it fair to charge me a different price for the exact same product? Watch out: other retailers, especially on-line retailers, are salivating at the opportunity to charge you more for the same book I buy for less on the same day (not 3 weeks in advance) from the same website, simply because they know more about you (University of Pennslvania's Annenberg Center 2005 report Open To Exploitation). This is possible largely because of information they've collected about you, mostly from invading your privacy, as EPIC points out. Is a transaction where the seller has so much more information than the buyer truly competitive or fair? I don't think so.