Friendly Skies

Virginia Postrel from the June 1993 issue

(Page 2 of 2)

As a "laissez faire theologian," I disagree. And, as a consumer, I take airline deregulation personally.

My family lives on the other side of the country. So do a lot of my friends and at least half the writers and editors I do business with. I remember when air fares were uniformly high and my family's hometown was served by only one airline, when lengthy trips required hour upon hour upon day of driving, when New York or California might as well have been the moon. Like many small- business. managers, I have a small budget and a big need for travel. I am grateful for fine-print specials that offer cheap fares to people who plan ahead.

Plus, I spent the heyday of deregulation, 1982 and '83, shuttling between Philadelphia and Boston on airlines that no longer exist (and probably shouldn't, given their levels of safety and service). In those days, you could get a weekend fare of $90. Nowadays, you'd pay $109 in real dollars. Higher, yes, but still not bad. The pre-deregulation fare (in '83 dollars) was $115. Alfred Kahn was good to long-distance love.

Deregulation has been good to me, and to most Americans. It has opened the skies to the general public and brought the country closer together. We are the silent majority of travelers and, yes, we are quite willing to stay over Saturday night.