So many people have unused gym memberships that the gym can afford to purchase 3 new treadmills every year. Seems like a fair tradeoff.
But you've strawmanned this. Do you go to the gym, put your towel down on the leg press machine, and then go to the juice bar for a drink? Because that's what we're discussing here: taking away a finite resource so that others can't use it.
People with unused gym memberships who don't show up haven't promised anything. They didn't make an appointment with a personal trainer, they don't have machines reserved, there's no implicit contract to exchange limited resources for a membership fee. Your membership fee gives you access to these resources, not a guarantee of their usage. If you go to the gym and every treadmill is in use, then you don't get a treadmill for now. You just wait for a treadmill.
evidently the airline priced that resource at a negative value. (Florida to Charlotte $X, Florida to Charlotte to NY $X-$Y.) so apparently that resource was worse than useless.
It's only negative if you think airline's pricing model is something simple like "distance traveled * cost per mile", which isn't the model that airlines with advanced revenue management systems use.
But you've strawmanned this. Do you go to the gym, put your towel down on the leg press machine, and then go to the juice bar for a drink? Because that's what we're discussing here: taking away a finite resource so that others can't use it.
People with unused gym memberships who don't show up haven't promised anything. They didn't make an appointment with a personal trainer, they don't have machines reserved, there's no implicit contract to exchange limited resources for a membership fee. Your membership fee gives you access to these resources, not a guarantee of their usage. If you go to the gym and every treadmill is in use, then you don't get a treadmill for now. You just wait for a treadmill.