Air Jamaica has announced a new policy on a couple of its routes. From now on, your first checked bag will be free, but additional checked bags will cost $25 each. Now, here's the kicker....the free bag will travel with you on your flight. All other bags will be delivered within 7 days.

Air Jamaica Announcement

This only looks like an issue for people that take 3 bags: 1 carry-on and 2 checked. Unless you're moving, that's an insane amount of stuff to take on an airplane.

The only surprise here is that it wasn't a US carrier that implemented this first.

You have never seen all the stuff Jamaicans(or, for that matter, a lot of other Caribbean and S. Americans) bring back home from the US. It's cheaper in the US, so they load up in the US and take it home. The bags are huge too. I've seen some that would probably fit a person inside.

I don't think the phenomenon of lugging large bags, when going home, is limited to people from this side of the hemisphere. When I flew to Europe in 2005, I remember seeing several families lugging home bags huge enough for a body.
From what I understand, they're bringing home gifts and other things that aren't available in their originating country.
Considering that most people stay at least several weeks when visiting family, Air Jamaica's policy makes sense.

Basically folks will be paying $25 to air ship up to 50 pounds to or from Jamaica with seven day or better delivery, which probably isn't that bad.

As others have mentioned, people sometimes bring home enormous amounts of gifts and so forth when they visit another country.

Geoff