Besides economically painful, what about economically viable, or logistically. Prices are a form of rationing. It's a way of the market saying, "to do more than this currently cannot be done." Prices rise until the number of people interested in some utility is less than that capacity. You cannot airlift more people out of Ukraine than currently fly on a normal day, especially while sharing airspace with a war. It is not simply a matter of paying for enough plane tickets. So many people think economies are financial instead of physical.