Country-sized, thriving and cosmopolitan population of almost 11.9 million people in the air every day makes a huge economy which a research by HSBC identifies and names as Flyland. The ‘country in the sky’ has grown to an economy with annual GDP of $400.5 billion – just larger than that of Norway. Flyland adds more than $1.26 billion to its value each day, according to the press release.
The data takes into consideration the average amount of flights Flyland citizens take in a year, their average income, average spend and considers the value of the average amount of work or business conducted in flight. According to the results, business travelers average two hours of work per flight, with leisure travelers not far behind at 1.3 hours. This adds up to $53.4 billion worth of work being completed at 35,000 feet.
Sky high spending power
In total, citizens spend an average of $91.90 per flight, including $7.89 for food, $3.10 for drink, $3.28 for Wi-Fi and $68.47 for duty free. The majority of these purchases are credit card transactions (70 percent), following a global trend of moving towards a cashless society.
Commenting on the study Marwan Hadi, Head of Retail Banking and Wealth Management, HSBC UAE, said: “Flyland is a fascinating lens through which we can see a diverse and outward looking group of people criss-crossing the world with considerable economic might.”
Local customs
But it’s not just a tin tube of tracking timesheets – the average citizen of Flyland spends two and a quarter hours sleeping, two hours enjoying the in-flight entertainment system, and 10 minutes working on personal admin. Around 15.3 million movies are watched each day in Flyland.
Like all diverse populations, there is a set of cultural customs to abide by. Thirty-six percent of Flyland citizens do not like it when people stand up as soon as the plane lands, 65 percent find it annoying when people are rude to cabin crew, and 47 percent dislike it when children are allowed to run loose. These numbers add weight to the statistic that there are 3.1 million arguments on Flyland every day.
Here is an infographic that summarizes the results of the HSBC research:
Source: HSBC