Update (also see my other posts in go to the discussion):
Just for "fun", I checked my 5GHz wireless setting (5th gen AEBS) and saw I had it set to a fixed channel, 153. Keep in mind, this worked fine for ages, and using iOS 7.1.2. Somewhere in the back of my head I remembered seeing someone who had some success with changing the setting to "Automatic". So, why not? Well, it worked! (For me anyway.) My iPad Airs are now (again) stable at or near 300mbps. The automatic setting chose channel 149, so I manually set it - that also worked. Back to 153 - no good. 161 sort of worked. Back to automatic and all seems ok.
I think my theory of the difference between iOS 8 and iOS 7.1.2, having to do with MIMO and 802.11n still holds. Something in how they are using multi-streams seems to be different.
I'm not sure I would consider switching the 5GHz channel selection to automatic is a "workaround", but it's borderline. If all was well with static channel (153, in my case) before the upgrade, I wouldn't expect it to change.
If setting the 5GHz band channel selection to automatic doesn't work, then there's still the option to use 2.4GHz. For right now, at least, I'm going to give it a go with the AEBS set to automatic. The Airs seem to work fine – now.