Way back in the day thanks to Ted Kennedy and the signature of Jimmy Carter the USA deregulated the airlines. But how is it holding up today.


What are we seeing now, other than "cheap" fares and low pay.

Before we start a flame war on here, what effect would re-regulation have on the airlines.

 

I'm not sure of the effect but the corporations themselves certainly would not want regulation.

 

The big established players might want it. Guaranteed profit margins and artificial restrictions on competition...what's not to love?

But that horse is long out of the barn, down the road, over the hill, and never to be seen again.

 

Yeah, I think they'd all love it. Everyone would be fat and happy like the good ol' Pan Am days. Pilots would make 300k a year, management would never take a loss, and Joe Passenger probably couldn't afford his ticket anymore.

That's why it won't happen. With the Internet, there's a lot more accountability these days, and everyone would question why the government is essentially subsidizing airlines and killing competition.

I think Deregulation was the right move - we are a free market economy, after all. But man, it would've been sweet to be a pilot back in the day.

 

But that horse is long out of the barn, down the road, over the hill, and never to be seen again.[/QUOTE]

A friend of my Dad's who retired in early 1980, and was number one at a major, never saw or experienced the effects of deregulation. I have since retired and do remember him telling me that once off the gate, he was airborne within five minutes and if he wasn't, it was because of one of two reasons.....weather or a mechanical. And it was like that for him spanning his whole carer from 1946 - 1980. Can you even imagine? Do they teach patience in ground school these days?

 

They aren't really "deregulated", they are kept in a status where each one can't really compete with each other, given many subsidies (some exist on these alone), and prevented from failing. Routes and other aspects still have much "regulation" built into them. "In between" is worse than either option IMO. In any capitalist economy things need to "fail" every once and a while so that better things can rise up from the ashes. This is kept from happening.

 

Phying Phil,

I wonder what you liked about the regulated era? Companies didn't make huge profits or even guaranteed profits. They competed by offering chef-prepared meals, free drinks, etc all of which ate into profits. Pilots suffered regular furloughs until advanced seniority; I flew with several that hated "summer employment". If your lines route was hurt by a recession, too bad--furlough time. In our dynamic economy there would be NO chance at jumping into markets like Williston, ND because the oil industry was hot there.

Strikes were common enough and airlines paid the struck carrier under mutual aid pacts. NW and National made profits during strikes. PAA went bust mostly because it thought it owned Washington until it didn't.

Load factors were in the 50% range; flying was luxury few could afford so pilot employment would be much less than today. Consumers would be hurt because travel would out of reach.

Overall, not good for the public or pilots.

GF

 

Airlines were guaranteed profit margins of up to 12%, and could bill the government retroactively for it. Just like today, some managed that money better than others.

PAA went bust because they had no domestic network to feed all of their 747's, and when the price of oil began to climb, along with the Lockerbie bombing and then the first Gulf War, Pan "Am" became Pan "Ain't."

Re-regulation would definitely not be good for the public.