November 19, 2015 9:53AM # Air Hostesses Then and Now By [Marian L. Tupy](https://www.cato.org/people/marian-l-tupy) --- SHARE In the mid-1960s, being an air hostess was considered to be a glamorous job. Back then, however, air stewardesses were paid less than half of what they make today. They also had to endure much longer flights, since 1960s airplanes carried relatively little fuel and had to stop for refueling. That also meant that flight attendants had to serve more meals and, consequently, worked harder during the flight. Most importantly, the likelihood of dying on the job declined substantially. In 1965, there were [1,142 airplane fatalities](http://humanprogress.org/static/2626) per [250 million passengers](http://humanprogress.org/story/2268) carried worldwide. Only [761 people died](http://humanprogress.org/static/2626) out of [over 3 billion people](http://humanprogress.org/story/2268) who flew in 2014. ![Media Name: AirHostess_Comparison.jpg](/sites/cato.org/files/styles/pubs_2x/public/social-images/airhostess_comparison.jpg?itok=h120DmXS) ##### Related Tags [General](https://www.cato.org/general) [![Creative Commons License](/build/cato_2020/images/creative-commons.svg)](http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/) This work is licensed under a [Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/).