Politicians keep telling us that the world is plagued with rich bastards who are stealing all of the fruits of our labor and hoarding up treasure like Grendel’s mom in Beowulf.
Apparently contradicting this message is the fact that Gulfstream G650s are sitting on the used market in large numbers. (“Analyst Raises Alarm over Rising Used G650 Inventory”)
Readers: How can we explain this? Is it that rich douchebags are now so rich that they need a Boeing Business Jet or Airbus converted to executive configuration? And there are no “middle class rich bastards” who have $50 million to spare and want to travel with about 10 friends?
Maybe the airlines are getting good enough that rich bastards don’t need their own planes. Casey Neistat posts videos all the time of the insane 1st class accommodations he gets.
Jack: I don’t think that is the answer. Emirates First Class is surely awesome but they don’t fly from Palm Beach to New York City or from New York to LA or any of the other typical legs flown by a U.S.-operated Gulfstream (which of course can go international but doesn’t usually; http://compair.aviationresearch.com/database_files/theimage_350.pdf says that the average Gulfstream G-V flight was only 2.2 hours.)
New Jersey is running out of rich bastards, apparently: http://nypost.com/2016/04/10/this-man-could-destroy-new-jersey-by-moving-to-florida/
(maybe more appropriate to the previous post)
Perhaps this is a result of fractional ownership (NetJets, etc.)? This would use a much smaller pool of jets more efficiently.
J: I would agree with you regarding Netjets, but on the other hand they’ve been around for a long time so it is not a shock to the market.
No idea what I’m talking about, but 10 years ago wouldn’t those things mostly have all been busy flying executives to meetings all over the place? There’s really less need for that stuff now because the software is so much better and the internet actually works.
Bobby: I don’t think that a G650 is about “need”; it is more about “want”. Consider only the global douchebag circuit, where Ellen Pao met her husband (see http://philip.greenspun.com/blog/2015/07/26/global-douchebag-circuit-aspen-institute-ellen-pao-and-buddy-fletcher/ ). There’s TED, SxSW, Davos, Aspen Institute, etc. Don’t forget the ski retreat in winter and the fly fishing trips in the summer.
A used $30M G550 with 6750nm range is good enough for me. I can’t justify spending $60M on a G650 for just marginally more capability 🙂
Could it be the mid-tier Russian oligarchs can’t get their G650’s repaired? This article link from 2014 seems to support that. BTW, I’d take an S100 any day. Looking forward to flying on Interjet’s S100 fleet some day.