Unfortunately the travelling public have been conditioned to think that paying anymore than £30 return for a 1 hour flight is expensive.
I flew from STN to CPH yesterday with Easyjet. The total cost of the trip was £62.99 - a bargain especially as it included taxes etc. However this was one of the more expensive fares on the plane as I booked it less than a week ago.
People will quite happily pay £70 return for a 1 hour train journey or £25 per day in car parking at LHR or whatever that 15 minute train to Paddington rips one off by these days but try charging more than tuppence for the air fare and there is uproar.
Unfortunately it is a highly "sexy" industry that we operate in where every tom, dick and harry wants to be and make money. One or two Low cost carriers have made a success of it and now everyone wnat a slice of the cake happily cutting their own and everyone elses throats in the process.
Whilst I would not make any friends by saying so the only way to avoid earning peanuts as an F/O is not to work for the carriers that pay peanuts.