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...jets sold increased percent between 2006 and 2007 alone. Sales of these jets increased 18 percent between 2005 and 2006 alone. And corporate jet ownership has increased by about 70 percent since the early 1990s.
Universal Jet Aviation, a Florida-based company, claims that business has increased by 50 percent since 9/11. Bookajet, the United Kingdom's oldest private jet company, reported a 40 percent growth in business between the summer of 2005 and the summer of 2006. There is a four-year wait to buy Boeing's largest business jet, which is the size of its 737 airliner.
Private jets are in such high demand right now that, thanks to long lines to buy a new jet, used planes often sell for more than the price at which they were bought. New planes bought in 2006 now sell on the used market for an average of 22 percent higher than their purchase price, according to Vref, the standard price guide for the private jet industry.
Not only are private jets in higher demand, but they're also becoming more luxurious and expensive. Boeing's largest business jet costs $67 million. Other companies sell airplanes that are nearly as costly: Airbus's priciest plane goes for $55 million, while Gulfstream Aerospace's G550 sells for $46 million.
The private jet market is truly a global one, with the main manufacturers reporting that half or more of sales are coming from outside of North America.
Demand is particularly booming in the Persian Gulf, where oil-rich sheiks are spurring annualized sales growth of 10 percent to 15 percent in the region. In Sandi Arabia, private individuals own 160 jets, and this number is expected to double in the next five years. Special terminals for private jets are being built in Bahrain, Dubai, Qatar and Abu Dhabi.
Private and corporate jets give the super-rich not just ease and comfort, convenience and luxury, but a way to distinguish themselves from everyone else. Private jet marketing explicitly emphasizes the elite status and conspicuousness of this consumption.
With concern about excessive wealth concentration on the rise, it is logical to focus attention on private and corporate jets, and perhaps a luxury jet tax will capture some politician's fancy.
But for now, it turns out that the private and corporate jet industry--and its high flyers--are embroiled in a series of controversies, over use of shareholder money, plane safety rules, the functioning of the U.S. air control system and the environment. The narrow base of private and corporate jet users puts them on the defensive in these policy disputes, but their wealth and the private and corporate jet industry's concentrated lobbying and political power make them able antagonists in Washington, D.C. policy disputes.
MANUFACTURERS
The private jet industry is dominated by Cessna Air craft, a Wichita, Kansas-based business owned by corporate conglomerate Textron. Cessna sells more private jets than any other company. Textron bought Cessna from General Dynamics (the current owner of Gulfstream Aerospace) in 1992.
Cessna delivered 387 business jets, 80 turboprops and 807 piston aircraft in 2007, flying past its 2006 performance of 307 business jets, 67 turboprops and 865 piston aircraft. Just over half of the company's sales were outside the United States. Cessna says it plans to deliver 470...
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