About Gary Leff

Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel - a topic he has covered since 2002. Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »

More articles by Gary Leff »

Comments

  1. Reduced to a single precheck queue for the whole airport, Austin has become a real mess.

    Gary, why do you still live in Austin? You can do your job from anywhere. Move to the NYC metro.

    Austin didn’t take off post-pandemic as many had hoped. Now the fact is you have 2 kids and they need an education. As an erstwhile New Yorker yourself, you don’t need me to tell you that the NYC metro is where you raise kids if you want them to be educated and successful under conventional terms. Kids who grow up in/near NYC are exposed to an extreme contrast between the rich and poor which lets them know “yeah, being poor really sucks, so I’m going to work hard to be rich.” Furthermore, the opportunities for hard workers in New York are abundant. Contra the middle of the country where such opportunities are, to say the least, limited.

    NYC has outstanding schools in ways that other cities don’t. Peers, teachers, and fellow parents are cultured and worldly in ways that people in other cities aren’t.

    Also, NYC area airports (including EWR) have TSA Touchless, the type where you just look into the camera. No ID or boarding pass to show. The longest I have ever waited in such a line has been about 30 seconds.

  3. It’s not uncommon to have a long line at TSA Pre Check and you look over there’s no line at regular screening. Usually the result of not enough ID checkers at Pre Check and/or those billion dollar machines that take forever.

  4. Being careful of social media postings in relationship to keeping a job has been going on for quite a few years and not just with the airlines. When applying for a job, new prospects may be requested to disclose all social media accounts. This is much more intrusive than before where you were not required to list your friends and write down the conversations you had with them. A reason to be anonymous or even deceptive in communications. New bosses try to gain control over what was written even though the original employment contract said nothing about what was written. My brother, who is paid well as a programmer and IT professional, has zero social media accounts.

  5. My brother, who is paid well as a programmer and IT professional, has zero social media accounts.

    Zero social media is a huge red flag these days. Your dates can’t look you up. You can’t e-schmooze with clients and colleagues (current, former, or prospective). Not all social media is meme sh*tposts with neo-Nazis.

    I’m not going to invalidate your opinion that your brother was paid well. But, to elaborate on my prior comment about NYC, raising kids here has one major advantage. They will have high standards. In ass-backwards middle America, you’re paid well if you make $200,000. In NYC, you aren’t paid well if you make $2,000,000.

  6. @Richard (don’t be a Dick) – There’s a reason people left NYC and continue to leave it. Woke schools are only part of it. Attitudes like yours are the other part. That and the failure to prosecute anyone but ex-presidents. And I happen to like NYC. But anyone I know who lives there tells me not to move there right now.

  7. Once in Austin, I saw the regular line much shorter than Pre, so moved over to it. But I found it did not save time as you have to take everything out and the people were a lot slower.

    Incidentally, at IAD I have seen Pre much shorter than Clear.

  9. Please, everyone, ignore Dick. He has horrible ideas.

    @Dick — Cut it out, man. You always go way too personal on here. Not cool. And you’re giving New Yorkers a bad name. As one, I feel shame for the way you are portraying our actually great city and state.

    @Rich — NYC is wonderful to visit and to live. All are welcome here.

  10. “Personal” is your opinion and New Yorkers are infamously reserved in a way that most of the rest of the world finds cold and rude. You’ve surely heard New Yorkers are rude? That’s not because New Yorkers want people to get outta the way. Everybody wants people to get outta the way. People say New Yorkers are rude because they’re cold and distant. Stop doing this. Take an interest in people and get to know them personally. If you don’t want to do this GET THE HELL OUTTA THE CITY and move to the middle of nowhere and die of cancer.

  13. So many people use social media to publicize EVERYTHING they observe, say and do. Those same people post things about other people. It is an obsession that borders on profoundly stupid. So when these same stupid (remember, ignorance can be fixed…stupid is forever) people post information critical of their job and/or their employer and do so by posting irrefutable negative information, the company should take action and, if necessary, terminate the employee. Those who scream, “It violates my free speech” better read the Constitution, Amendment #1 and note the first four words “Congress shall make no law…”

Comments are closed.