Hate to say it,
Sunfish, but some of the responses to your own questions are far too simplistic and not thought through.
Some of you claim that Singapore, Malaysian, Emirates, etc. are government subsidised and offer us services at or below cost. The correct rationalist economic response to this is to buy their services - that way the Government of Singapore is subsidising my travel.
You may well ask, what happens to Qantas staff, employment and so on. (Yes, I do!) What about the benefit to Australia? The answer to that in Economic rationalist terms is stark. Australians benefit by being subsidised by Singapore and the Arabs. We get to spend the money we save on other useful things to the benefit of the Australian economy.
How much do you think an unemployed person, drawing Social Welfare benefits, costs each Australian,
Sunfish?
A f
ing lot MORE than "
the money we (spend) on other useful things"
So once we "financially astute" Australians allow QANTAS to go under, and SQ (for example) now has a monopoly, which direction do you think prices might head?
Oh, but I forgot the solution
Thats simple- we start another airline.
Who's the "we"? And if starting another airline was as "simple" as you state, why don't you think other simpletons haven't been kicking them off, left, right, and centre, to compete with QF on some of their other routes.
