When will it ease up or do we need the government to step in again? ie. regulation.

[Big Duke Six]

My 2 cents:

Cost plus 10%? Not a bad idea really. Easy to monitor too, if you just take known CASM numbers from each airline and do the math.

But as a minimum, I think that a great law would be that WHILE YOU"RE IN FREAKING BANKRUPTCY, YOU CAN'T CHARGE LESS FOR A TICKET THAN WHAT IT COSTS YOU TO PRODUCE THAT SEAT FOR THAT TRIP.

I'll say it again: UAL charging $59 round trip from DEN to RNO this summer should have been illegal, especially when they didn't have to pay their bills in bankruptcy. UAL employees laugh when they see it, knowing full well that UA's only motive there was to stick it to whoever the competition was, again while also knowing that they didn't have to worry about how they would have to pay for it.

Our "system" that allows carriers to pull this BS while in bankruptcy is broken. It is yet another reason our whole industry is dying.

 

[English]

Why not let the free market determine ticket prices, but have the government REGULATE fuel surcharges, across the board, at every passenger-carrying airline?

For example, when a barrel of oil costs $25, the fuel surcharge would be zero (X). For each $1 increase in price of oil per barrel, the fuel surcharge would increase $1. So, when oil is at $45 per barrel, the surcharge would be $20 per ticket one way (X + 20).

The numbers could be variable - the real thing that seems necessary is government intervention during fuel price crises. If airline managment can't make money when fuel prices go up, they shouldn't be taking money from labor (and pensions) in exchange. The result is an eventual reliance on the government to bail them out anyway, might as well try some preventative medicine.

 

[minitour]

...But as a minimum, I think that a great law would be that WHILE YOU"RE IN FREAKING BANKRUPTCY, YOU CAN'T CHARGE LESS FOR A TICKET THAN WHAT IT COSTS YOU TO PRODUCE THAT SEAT FOR THAT TRIP....

That would be a horrible law! It would make sense....I mean....if laws made sense, we wouldn't need lawyers...think of the unemployment

-mini