You Are Not Free to Move About the Country

The Transportation Department announced a plan this month to discourage airlines from inflicting delays on passengers. The proposal, expected to be released in full later this year, would require airlines to pay customers in cash when their flights are significantly delayed, over and above granting them refunds.

After the operational meltdowns of the 2022 holiday season and amid a widespread sense of a qualitative service decline, the cash compensation idea for tardy departures will surely score President Joe Biden and Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg some political points. What it will not do is catalyze the thoroughgoing, durable industry improvement we need. If we want a better air travel experience in the U.S., it’s time to open the skies to international competition.

Air cabotage laws stemming from the Civil Aeronautics Act of 1938 ban foreign airlines from operating routes between U.S. airports. An impressive carrier like Japan Airlines can fly from Tokyo Narita to LAX, but it cannot fly passengers from Los Angeles to Seattle, Dallas, or anywhere else within the United States. As a result, U.S. airlines are insulated from the healthy competition that has generated a better air travel experience in other parts of the world.

Despite having the world’s highest-revenue domestic air travel market, U.S. domestic flyers are limited to mediocre carriers. The first U.S. airline to appear on the Skytrax global airline rankings, Delta, is all the way down at number 24. According to AirHelp’s on-time performance metric—the specific aspect of air travel the Biden plan targets—Delta is again the best domestically, but nine foreign airlines do better.

Rather than add to the complexity of domestic fare pricing with the threat of compelled cash payments, wouldn’t U.S. air travelers benefit more from having a wider array of airlines to choose among?

Given the authorization to do so, top global performers such as Singapore Airline