If you were flying during the last few months of 2015, you paid some of the lowest airfares in five years.
The Transportation Department’s latest stats for the last quarter of 2015 shows the average domestic fare decreased to $363 in the fourth quarter of 2015, down 8.3 percent form $396 in the fourth quarter of 2014.
Related: Low Jet Fuel Prices Are Pushing Airfares to 3-Year Lows
The fourth-quarter 2015 fare was down 14.4 percent from the average fare of $462 in 2000, the highest inflation-adjusted fourth quarter average fare in the 20 years the DOT began collecting air fare records in 1995. The 14.4 percent decline took place while overall consumer prices rose 34.9 percent. Since 1995, inflation-adjusted fares declined 10.8 percent.
U.S. passenger airlines collected 75.0 percent of their total revenue from passenger fares during the third quarter of 2015, down from 87.6 percent in 1995.
