Influencer Says Skinny Passengers Deserve Free Checked Bags — Wants Airlines to Charge by Total Weight You Bring Onboard

Airlines enforce hard weight limits on checked bags, and charge you if you go over. But they don’t charge extra for very heavy passengers, even though passenger weight matters just as much for the plane’s total weight as bags do – and jet fuel is expensive.

An influencer claims, therefore, that “skinny” passengers are being forced to “subsidize” heavier passengers. She calls it “weight redistribution” and “discrimination” and she proposes a single total weight allowance for each traveler. Your ticket comes with a certain amount of weight, and it’s up to you how to distribute that between your body, carry-on and checked bag.

Skinny people should be allowed to bring heavier luggage onto flights the cause I’m really passionate about because you’re telling me that my luggage was 51 pounds and you’re like oh that’s overweight, oh that’s overweight

I dare you to say that to the person who’s next to me on my flight who is 400,000 pounds overweight but no no you won’t do that because this is weight redistribution. This is what the left’s trying to do they don’t want people to be skinny.

You should just have a total weight allocation that you’re given for your flight could be on your body or in your luggage or in your carry-on, but you do what that’s your business.

This is discrimination and I will not be silent in the face of it.

Airlines need to institute total weight allocation

Healthy people subsidize the morbidly obese everywhere pic.twitter.com/oUGuBnQMvc

— Arynne Wexler (@ArynneWexler) January 30, 2026

Unsurprisingly, this seems fairly popular in internet comments for the same reason Indian philosopher Osho criticized democracy. People feel like this seems “fair” and that pay by weight is a simple fairness standard, since “a pound is a pound.”

Of course, people aren’t going to want to weigh in at the check-in counter (no more app check-in until the app can reliably weigh you) or the gate (slowing down boarding). And it’s awkward to disclose your weight to counter staff.

In any case, checked bag fees and limits aren’t primarily about fuel so the cost here isn’t the issue. And this is meant as culture war bait not a serious proposal. (It worked.) But while we’re at it, this ‘conservative take’ actually hurts men most since they’re on average heavier than women.

• A major reason for bag weight limits is risk in bag handling and wear on baggage systems. There’s special labeling of bags over 50 pounds and 70 pounds is generally an upper limit per bag. Nobody is carrying passengers onto the plane, or if they are they’re using specialized equipment.

• Fuel isn’t the biggest driver of ticket cost. It’s about a quarter to a third of airline operating costs, depending on the direction of oil at a given time. Most airline costs aren’t driven by passenger or checked bag weight. And airlines don’t price seats off marginal cost in any case (for any given flight in the short-run, willingness to pay matters more than cost). The subsidy claim relies on passengers paying their marginal cost but that’s not how pricing works.

• Baggage fees are a revenue tool, and a tax arbitrage tool (moving money out of the fare and into fees saves airlines on the 7.5% excise tax on domestic fares). They aren’t going to give that up in the name of fairness to thin women.

There are a number of reasons we don’t really see airlines charging passengers by the pound. For instance, the Air Carrier Access Act prohibits discrimination against passengers with disabilities. If weight is linked to a medical condition (e.g., obesity tied to a disability), charging more could be viewed as discriminatory unless the airline can show it’s a legitimate safety or operational necessity. Even without a medical disability, a weight-based policy could disproportionately affect certain demographic groups, potentially opening the door to claims under civil rights laws.

Now, airlines actually do weigh passengers from time to time, but that’s about regulatory compliance and validating passenger weight averages for fuel and balance calculations.

Ultimately I think the framing here is wrong that overweight passengers are taking advantage of the airline, and that other passengers should be able to bring more checked bags. In reality, the conflict is airlines sell a seat, but some passengers don’t fit in the seat. So they take up part of another passenger’s seat. The issue with larger passengers is when they directly impinge on the comfort of others, which is why I do think passengers should be required to purchase the amount of space on the aircraft that they need.