Not a political or even an economic argument. The purpose of regulation is to get the consumer something that is a decent product for a decent price, in a manner that is efficient in time and money.
Virgin has proved that on a level playing field they can compete on product, via Virgin Atlantic. Jet Blue was the first Domestic Carrier to even try on the Product Front. The US carriers are apalling and quite frankly embarassing. Even the us automakers have been improving their quality and design in the past 5 years. If they can do it, so can the airlines. =/
The regulations (domestic) are largely about planes not falling out of the sky. They do a pretty good job on that.
The international regulations are both about planes not falling out of the sky (which is good for basically all international airlines, bad for some national domestic airlines), and about political things like who gets how many gates, who is allowed to pick up passengers where, etc.
Some of it is about documenting price and standardizing other terms of carriage, but very little is about consumer comfort or anything like that.
This is a good elucidation. Still a crap product, though. And arguably the business practices of the Airlines are geared towards making informed decisions more difficult. The regulatory body should actually look at <this>, precisely because they are new (these practices were not at all common prior to y2k). Opaque pricing as a marketing strategy, in particular, is a policy concern. The net result is the cost of a trip -- in time and money -- are almost impossible to predict. Part of this is pricing, part of this is the assymetry of the ticketing terms. This makes reasonable economic allocation decisions problematic. And that is actually an issue, for the public and for the regulatory bodies to consider. I'm normally not a fan of bueracracy, but the ticket sizes ($1,000's per year) and the multiplier effect (cost of doing everybody elses business changes) is such that some basic frameworks would probably be productive. In particular, if the industry is on a level playing field, it wouldn't be distortive to competition (any more so then the current concetration issues or the impact of opacity on mkt efficiency).
The obvious problem with this is that one generations "floor" of minimum quality becomes the next "ceiling" when tech changes and innovation promises better/faster/cheaper ways of doing things. Once the power is given to write the rules, then the special interests will ensure they are written for their benefit. Etc. But its still worth thinking the problem through. To big an issue to not even try.
Look at the impact that Heathrow had. It provided London and the UK with a massive advantage over the past 20 years as the English speaking gateway to the EU. And thats despite all of its limitations and problems.
-- Not enough, or not in the right way.
Not a political or even an economic argument. The purpose of regulation is to get the consumer something that is a decent product for a decent price, in a manner that is efficient in time and money.
Virgin has proved that on a level playing field they can compete on product, via Virgin Atlantic. Jet Blue was the first Domestic Carrier to even try on the Product Front. The US carriers are apalling and quite frankly embarassing. Even the us automakers have been improving their quality and design in the past 5 years. If they can do it, so can the airlines. =/