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Travel in some primitive parts of the world is a
nightmare — passengers are treated like livestock, service is surly,
rules are ridiculous, delays are common, and the whole experience is
dreadful. Luckily, here in sophisticated America, we have modern airlines
— on which passengers are treated like livestock, service is surly,
rules are ridiculous, delays are common, and the whole experience is
dreadful.
Airline executives publicly blame everything from the
impact of 9/11 to bad weather, but when these executives talk to
shareholders and the business media, they gleefully confess that they have
deliberately created such unpleasantness as a crude way to jack up their
stock prices and profits. For example, although the public demand for air
travel has steadily increased, airline honchos have intentionally decreased
the number of flights. That’s the opposite of how a free market
economy is supposed to work: If consumer demand is up, companies
theoretically respond by increasing supply. But air travel is a monopolistic market, with one or
two airlines controlling nearly all airports — so, by cutting the
number of available seats, not only can the monopolists create an
artificial shortage that raises ticket prices, they also create overbooked
flights that have all the charm of cattle cars. Meanwhile, they’ve also made drastic cuts in
staff, leading to more breakdowns and flight delays, as well as to less
service for customers. The staff that remains has had its wages and
benefits slashed, which doesn’t help morale. And to make employees
even more surly, CEOs have started paying themselves millions of dollars in
bonuses.
On the basis of these manipulations, one airline
president enthusiastically told shareholders, “We see an encouraging
revenue environment.” Sure, boss — and we passengers see a
discouraging decline into primitive levels of travel. Thanks for nothing.
Jim Hightower is a national radio commentator,
columnist, and author.
This article appears in Jul 26 – Aug 1, 2007.
