Today the administration of railway in China announce that the food served in the trains should not be more expensive than 15 yuan. People cheer for it and think that the railway stations and airports should have gauged their profit and given it back to customers long time ago.
But why are the prices in the airports and railway stations so expensive? This morning I stumbled upon a Chinese journalist's comment and I was shocked to see that in the article he claimed that "It's known to all that the airport is monopolizing the price. They set the prices at will so that they can maximize the profit."
The question is: Is it true that the airport officers set the price? Or the prices are set by others for a certain reason?
In my opinion, it's the market that set the price. The restaurants get into the airport to do business because (1)airports have a lot of customers (2)airports have strict security examination, passengers cannot take liquid, so the demand for food and drink can be great.
Based on these reason, selling food in airports can be profitable. But the reality is that the airports are scarce compared to the amount of restaurants which want to enter and get the money. Now comes the crucial point: How can a restaurant get into the airport and sell the food? It must pay rent to get the land,but since there are so many competitors, a higher rent is needed.
So, the cost of selling food in an airport is already higher than that in other ordinary area, the higher prices aren't so peculiar.
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