Posted on 04/18/2017 11:54:41 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
That the forceful ejection of a United Airlines passenger the Sunday before last proved so newsworthy indicated something that’s largely been ignored by the airline’s myriad critics and “advisers.” What happened was news precisely because it’s so rare.
But for a commentariat prone to turning anecdote into statistic, United’s resort to force when it came to properly removing David Dao (more on this in a bit) from one of its airplanes was naturally (to the chattering class, at least) a sign of a tone-deaf airline; one clueless about customer service thanks to a culture within the airline that doesn’t prioritize it. United’s actions were apparently also a sign that its executives don’t understand the auction process that economists – who’ve almost to a man and woman never run a business – can apparently design in their sleep. Oh please.
Back to reality, we all know why airlines frequently sell more seats than are physically available. They do so because they have a good sense based on years of statistical analysis of roughly how many no-shows there will be for each flight. The major airlines are plainly good at divining the no-show count as evidenced by travel journalist Gary Leff’s stats in USA Today revealing that, “Out of over 600 million passengers boarding major U.S. airlines in 2015, half a million didn’t have seats. Most of those voluntarily gave up their seats.” Leff adds that the latter explains why a mere 46,000 passengers were actually involuntarily denied boarding in 2015, a rate of 0.09%, according to Leff’s calculations. Again, Dao’s ejection was news precisely because what happened almost never does.
Despite this, economists have as mentioned used United’s alleged error to showcase their presumed worth. You see, economists claim to solve problems. Crunching numbers in their cubicles free of the pressures that concern those who actually run businesses, they come up with “solutions” for those businesses.
Case in point is Robert Samuelson, resident economist at the Washington Post. Though he acknowledges that there are lots of public policy problems that “cannot be easily solved,” he contends that “Fixing airline overbooking is not one of them.” Samuelson’s solution is for airlines to consult another economist who has largely spent his adult years contemplating the many great problems businesses face from Harvard’s leafy campus. According to Samuelson, Greg Mankiw has a plan for the airlines. Here it is:
“Make the airlines pay when they overbook. When they do, ‘they should fully bear the consequences. They should be required (by government regulation) to keep raising the offered compensation until they get volunteers to give up their seats," writes Mankiw. "If $800 does not work, then try $1,600 or $8,000.’"
Samuelson adds that the professor in Mankiw is "sure volunteers will appear as the price rises." Samuelson agrees with the professor, but would “tweak” his proposed imposition of force on businesses “by requiring that all the bumped passengers receive the highest payment.”
Of course the problem for Samuelson and Mankiw, along with countless other economists awoken by United’s alleged error, is that airlines have long been doing what they propose. We know this because airlines regularly oversell flights, only for them to offer rising rates of compensation to reserved passengers assuming they don’t have enough seats. Sorry economists, airlines have long employed the auction process that has oddly given your profession its day in the sun.
As for the proposed regulations offered up by economists mostly untouched by the real world, they’re passing strange simply because economists generally pay lip service to the truism that there’s no such thing as a “free good.” But in demanding federal compensation rules as Samuelson, Mankiw et al are, they act as though the compensation will be paid by 'someone else.' Back to reality, assuming the federal imposition of highly generous compensation for bumped passengers, this will reveal itself either through reduced seat availability for consumers, much higher prices for the consumers in search of low-priced fares, or both. Well-heeled economists presumably don’t consider this truth simply because their air travel is likely not of the supersaver variety.
Regarding Dao, it’s well known at this point that the flight he’d booked a ticket for wasn’t oversold as much as United wanted to transport four crew members to Kentucky in order to staff a flight the next day. So that the airline could serve many more passengers, it bumped Dao, along with three other willing customers. And while PR mavens can fight among themselves about the brand implications of United’s actions vis-à-vis Dao, it’s worth pointing out that the airline did the right thing in removing the obnoxious passenger from the plane.
Lest we forget, a purchase of an airline ticket, particularly a supersaver ticket, is not a guaranteed reservation in the traditional, contract sense. A supersaver ticket is low-priced precisely because such a fare might be bumped – albeit rarely – based on a lack of seats. In Dao’s case he didn’t have a reservation as much as he’d booked the strong possibility of flying when he wanted to. United was correct in removing him much as any business would be correct in removing from its premises any individual engaged in the act of taking. The seat was United’s to allocate, not something owned by Dao.
About this, readers can rest assured that United’s most frequent passengers, as in the ones that generate the most revenue for the airline, are the least likely to be bumped. For members of the commentariat to defend Dao’s right to a seat is for those same members to reject the property rights of businesses. Federal regulations imposed on businesses regularly ignore property rights, and because they do costs for their customers rise to reflect government disdain for property.
The economist in Samuelson concludes that “Making airlines pay more for overbooking would, almost certainly, make them more careful in their scheduling, while also more adequately compensating inconvenienced passengers.” It’s a nice thought from the offices of the Washington Post, but if it’s so simple as Samuelson suggests, why the need for governmental force? Samuelson never considered the latter, and realistically didn’t consider business and economic realities much at all in penning his piece in which he explained to the airlines how they should operate, sans irony.
But for-profit businesses don’t need the help of economists largely unfamiliar with business or profits. As evidenced by how airlines regularly and seamlessly handle the good, pro-consumer strategy of overbooking, they’re already well aware of how to handle passenger overflow. The problem isn’t the airlines, but an economics commentariat ever eager to turn what’s singular into a statistic.
-- John Tamny is editor of RealClearMarkets, a Senior Fellow in Economics at Reason Foundation, and a senior economic adviser to Toreador Research and Trading
Not seeing that you can’t win a fight is a screw up. He didn’t have to fight, refusing to leave was a fight in and of itself. They had been informed that the plane wasn’t leaving until some passengers got off, he chose to inconvenience EVERYBODY for his own ego. That’s a screw up.
I never said United didn’t screw up. In fact quite the opposite, I’ve said multiple times they did. So stop lying about what I said. If you can’t own up to the simple fact that both sides were wrong, and you can’t put together a post without insults at least be man enough to no lie.
Oh the drama. When asked leave an aircraft you get up like an adult and walk off the plane. The only time you should act like a child, like Doc Dao, is if you are being deplaned at 30,000 feet. Then I could see acting like that.
It was a super saver seat and not guaranteed. For members of the commentariat to defend Dao’s right to a seat is for those same members to reject the property rights of businesses. Federal regulations imposed on businesses regularly ignore property rights, and because they do costs for their customers rise to reflect government disdain for property.
A plane is a public accommodation. Privately owned, pay to fly, but nonetheless a public accommodation. Like a skating rink or a stadium.
There are limits on what the operator can do.
A plane is subject to FAA regs. Passengers can be rejected and deplaned for any reason or no reason. If a crew member tells you to stand up and walk off the plan, you do it(provided the plane is on the ground).
Thanks for that information. I didn’t know United was still groveling to their investors about their monumental screw up /PR disaster. It’s understandable, though. They opted to play the part of brutal overlords, breakung, bruisinh, bloodying and concussing a legal, non-disruptive passenger rather than continue the quest for ***volunteers*** in a rational, humane way.
When you consider that United had already passed up two volunteers because they were unwilling to negotiate over a couple of hundred dollars in the ‘monopoly money,’ they were offereing, you see the exact problem. United didn’t want to re-accomodate their passengers; they wanted to prove to the world what bad a$$es they are.
‘Oh, so you don’t want to ‘volunteer’? After we put you in the hospital, we’ll see how many holdouts there are in the future-haha!’
Truly stupider than a sack of hammers.
Have you forgotten my request for links? You were going to backup your statement—unless it was a smear—that Dao had a history of out of control anger. Why would you post something like that with zero evidence? Please link to your source; thank you.
Also, since you mentioned hucksterism separately from the pain pilks, you obviously know of additional shady activities in Dao’s past. Please link to those too.
option 3) Police decline to intervene.
There will invariably be people on any given flight who do not necessarily HAVE to fly at that particular time, and wouldn't mind flying a little later in the day. The fact that three of the folks on that flight had no problem with the arrangement likely bears that out. When I fly, I'm usually not in so much of a hurry that delaying for a few hours would be a burden, given that the airline is willing to offer a voucher or help arrange another flight that day.
...I think, that UAL can remove Dao from its plane with no penalty other than that associated with breach of contract.
When common carrier airlines breach their contract of carriage they are breaking federal law.
That's part of the deal for being a common carrier
I’m not sure what point you’re trying to make with the quote, but I’ll say it’s a good quote and I agree with it. If we apply it to this example, I would say that ol’ Dr. Dao should never have been manhandled the way he was, regardless of his refusal to leave (which was in within his contractual rights, from what I understand). The idea that an airline would have a paying passenger violently removed simply to make room, or that the security guys would resort such aggressive tactics, is an indication that these people and organizations do not hold to those old standards of behavior. Forcing a seated passenger to leave at the literal last minute is a huge imposition, and the airline, if they had any decency, would have recognized that and acted accordingly. Instead, they thought they were in their legal right to boot the poor fellow off the plane in an undignified manner, and so they did, decorum and decency be damned.
It may be his right to stay in his seat; but, if the owner says go, he should go - because the law can't provide a peaceful solution to all situations.
There was a standard of proper behavior for the airline, too—and they violated it:
‘Demetrio [one of Dao’s attorneys] declined to discuss what kind of damages Dao might seek in a lawsuit, saying he doesn’t know the extent of the physical, emotional or psychological damage the man suffered. But, he said, the airline did not have the right to use “unnecessary force and violence” to remove a passenger who is not a threat.
“Common carriers have the highest duty of care to provide protection and safety to its fare-paying passengers,” he said, adding that the Chicago airport police who dragged Dao from the plane share in responsibility for the incident.’
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-live-stream-david-dao-presser-20170413-story.html
on what basis could other passengers sue? I’m not being argumentative — I just don’t know what would be the basis for John Doe to sue for an incident that happened to someone else (assuming John Doe was far away from David Dao, was not related or knew him in any way and was not bumped off or delayed)
You can find them yourself. Ny post for one. Dao is a queer, a mental illness. He sold prescriptions to meet up with another coprophiliac to vector diseases by fecal-oral transmission. This makes him a drug dealer and a huckster. It’s a federal crime. How many times, you can contact a bud with access to his record. How many times he didn’t get caught is speculation, but habits are habits.
So since he has a past record, that means you can outright lie about him and smear him.
Really.
Some of us believe in the Golden Rule. Others don’t.
First, you previously listed hucksterism as a separate crime. Now you’re conflating it with the one crime with which Dao has been charged, convicted, and fully punished. I knew you’d do that. It is the height of dishonesty, which is the stock in trade of far too many Dao haters.
It’s impossible to find something that doesn’t exist. Namely, the false, manufactured claim that Dao suffers from outbursts of extreme rage. You said that, but it was a lie. That is why neither you nor anyone else can providea citation. It doesn’t exist.
The smear merchants and hatemongers are having a field day. It’s disgusting and putrid.
One question for you. Are you homophilic?
I am a Christian. I recognize that we are all sinners. Our only hope is to be saved by the blood of Christ, by faith through grace.
Jesus didn’t save us so we could play holier than thou. He saved us so that we would love and serve the least among us. See Matthew 25: 31ff
Here’s another passage to ponder:
1 John 4:20
If someone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for the one who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen.
You didn’t answer the question. And calling people names is your way?
I certainly did answer your question. Christians hate the sin but love the sinner.
If I labeled something you said a “lie,” there is a simple solution. Just provide your source/link. Nothing could be easier.
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