Planes stopped being directed where Congressmen wanted them to fly.

Congressmen who are elected to represent the will of the people and serve in their interests. I'll take that over the airlines who serve only themselves and whose only motivation is to take as much money from the public as possible.

Right, because famously, politicians are totally selfless and never do anything self-serving.

When are aren't doing their job to our liking, we have the ability to remove them and replace them. Try doing that with the CEO of an airline.

An individual has about as much power in either case. How many congress people have been removed at your bidding?

An individual has more power in the airline case: you can fly a different airline much more easily than you can move to a location with a different representative.

Not at all, one individual won’t do anything against a business that large. And what if 1000s more people fly the airline and it becomes so wealthy it buys up all the other airlines? Corporations are authoritarian, tyrannical institutions where only the wealthy have any ability to make change. The US government may be immensely corrupt, owned by the rich, etc but at least it’s a democracy.

> And what if 1000s more people fly the airline and it becomes so wealthy it buys up all the other airlines?

Then there is gonna be a gold rush of airline startups leading to amazing innovation, offers and low prices for consumers. Unless your government intervenes and regulates the market into a monopoly of incumbents, of course.

> Corporations are authoritarian, tyrannical institutions

Corporations are at the mercy of their consumers and investors. They get toppled every day. Remember Nokia? Motorola? IBM? Zoom? Heck even Intel lately?

> the will of the people

is not at all the same thing as having a choice.

> without mandated service, cities and regions across the country have lost commercial air service

Yes, because nobody wants to run a business at a loss.

> It sounds like planes stopped being directed to where customers were

You're assuming the airlines are stupid. The fact that the airplanes were often nearly empty under regulation and nearly always full when unregulated is pretty strong evidence they were serving a far larger number of customers.

> Yes, because nobody wants to run a business at a loss.

Which is why some important services (like the post office) shouldn't be run as businesses.

> The fact that the airplanes were often nearly empty under regulation and nearly always full when unregulated is pretty strong evidence they were serving a far larger number of customers.

They are serving a far larger number of customers in areas A and B while now serving zero customers in areas C D E F and G. It might be far better if fewer people in areas A and B could fly if it meant that more people in the other areas could.

Airlines aren't stupid they are just doing everything they can to deliver the least to the public while charging the most they can extract from the public. Also, it isn't as if the changes airlines made to fill up seats couldn't have happened under regulation, or even that they never would have.

If you want a similar situation, look at Amtrak - it has stops in tiny towns that may see less than fifty disembarks/embarks a year, but it's nearly impossible for them to close the station or not stop there. Many times it'd be cheaper for Amtrak to hire a car to drive the people who use that station to the next station, but they're not allowed to reduce service because those small towns complain loudly.

You're suggesting that it's better to serve 10 people at double the price instead of 100 people at half the price. Never mind the enormous environmental cost of this inefficiency.

> they are just doing everything they can to deliver the least to the public while charging the most they can extract from the public

If you are sure they are gouging and making excessive profits, buy stock in the airlines and get your share.

> it isn't as if the changes airlines made to fill up seats couldn't have happened under regulation, or even that they never would have

They had 40 years to fix it and never did. The airlines fixed it overnight.

> You're suggesting that it's better to serve 10 people at double the price instead of 100 people at half the price. Never mind the enormous environmental cost of this inefficiency.

Yeah, I suggesting that at the very least it could be, if it means more Americans have access to an airport and airlines served a larger percentage of the country as opposed to only the areas that generated the most profit for them.

> If you are sure they are gouging and making excessive profits, buy stock in the airlines and get your share.

This wouldn't be the worst time. They suffered during the worst of the pandemic but are profitable this year. They'll be looking to claw back the profits they missed too so I expect prices and fees to continue to soar.

> Yeah, I suggesting that at the very least it could be, if it means more Americans have access to an airport and airlines served a larger percentage of the country as opposed to only the areas that generated the most profit for them.

This exact kind of logic was why, during communism here in Eastern Europe, we couldn’t find anything in stores: the government in its infinite wisdom was deciding who should build what and how much. Because the greedy companies would’ve built only whatever was profitable for them.

The predictable end-result? We were starving looking at empty shelves, while greedy capitalists in western countries were spoiling the consumer for choice.

> Yeah, I suggesting that at the very least it could be, if it means more Americans have access to an airport and airlines served a larger percentage of the country

Why would it mean that? It obviously didn’t work that way before deregulation and afterwards air travel became much more accessible to more people

> It might be far better if fewer people in areas A and B could fly if it meant that more people in the other areas could

How "might" it be "far better" to the public at large for airlines to serve fewer people at a higher cost?

> Airlines aren't stupid they are just doing everything they can to deliver the least to the public while charging the most they can extract from the public.

If they did as you suggest, they'd be demonstrably and measurably delivering FAR less to the public while charging even more money. You're arguing in both directions!

> How "might" it be "far better" to the public at large for airlines to serve fewer people at a higher cost?

For the same kinds of reasons it's better for the post office to serve people in remote areas at higher cost as opposed to leaving them without service and cut off. The same reasons why it's better for more Americans to have access to broadband, not just the Americans who live in the areas that would make ISPs the most profit. It can be worth it to spend more money when it means providing access to important services to more Americans vs a select few.

> If they did as you suggest, they'd be demonstrably and measurably delivering FAR less to the public while charging even more money.

Which is exactly the case. They ARE delivering less. Less access by only providing service to the locations which give them the most profit. Less leg room so that they can cram more people into every flight. Less service by cutting staff. Giving passengers fewer options/less choice. Allowing less baggage. Flights are increasingly canceled and delayed. Customer satisfaction gets lower and lower all the time. They are giving us less.

They are also charging more and more. Airline tickets are skyrocketing, outpacing inflation. Even as the service airlines provide keeps getting worse and worse, the prices keep getting higher, and higher but there are also the endless bullshit fees for everything they can think of (https://www.elliott.org/on-travel/hidden-airline-fees-are-ev...) which are often hidden.

> They ARE delivering less

They are serving far more people at far lower ticket prices than when they were regulated. I.e. deregulation enabled them to put the planes where the people are.

Do you know how much it costs to fly a jetliner? Why does it make sense to you that a 767 should fly into a rural airport to pick up 3 passengers?

> For the same kinds of reasons it's better...

These examples are not demonstrative of what you are arguing. If you were to instead propose "closing half of all UPS stores in densely populated cities and reallocating them to rural environments" it would be an apt comparison, and equally illogical.

There is an argument to be had (maybe) about expanded airline access for less populated geos. There is only an asinine argument to be had about doing that at the cost of reduced service for major population centers.

I’m replying here since the other comment is too deep.

Congress very specifically, by design, does NOT represent the will of the people. It represents the will of land area. Even the part that was originally supposed to be representative of population no longer is due to shenanigans, and also over-represents land instead of people. We probably shouldn’t get into the pros and cons of this system here, but I did want to correct your fundamental misunderstanding.

The main difference is that if you don't like how congress runs something, you can vote in someone else. You can't vote out the CEO of Delta Airlines. You are powerless and should expect the airline to treat you as such

Or you can fly United, or American, or...

That assumes you have the option. Not all airlines fly to all locations. They love to carve up route maps and build up fortress hubs to prevent competition.

Do they fly out of the airport I normally depart from, or any other that is within a 2 hour drive?

You can buy stock in Delta Airlines, which entitles you to vote on the management of the company.

Check out the 5 year chart of Delta stock. It's gone from $60 to $38. I'm wondering what happened to all that profit you alleged.

https://www.google.com/search?q=delta+airlines+stock

The places that lost service were small population areas that nobody wanted to fly to/from. Places that people want to fly get service, and it is a lot cheaper as they don't have to subsidize empty flights where nobody wants to go.

Congress still subsidizes airlines to fly to some smaller airports through the Essential Air Service program. It's not a mandate; airlines can choose whether to participate.

https://www.transportation.gov/policy/aviation-policy/small-...