Greetings misd-agin:
My comments were meant to describe US deregulation as only partial deregulation, and they are admittedly selective and quite brief, due to the desire to compress the descriptions here.
From Wikipedia:
"Essential Air Service subsidies effective 10 years from enactment". We flew to some of those towns in the EMB-110 and SD3-30/60.
"...CAB was authorized to grant antitrust immunity to air carriers".
But mergers require Department of Justice approval.
In "Airline Deregulation: The Unfinished Revolution" by R.W. Poole Jr. and Viggo Butler:
"In deregulation, Congress unleashed market forces on one segment of the air travel system-but failed to free up the critical infrastructure on which airlines depend, namely the airports and the air traffic control system.
These essential elements of the air travel system remain not only govt.-controlled, but government-owned."
These comments are certainly selective but appear to be valid in the general sense, based upon everything written about our system in "Aviation Week", the "Wall Street Journal" and observed by the older guys in the left seat years ago, many of whom started flying in the early 70s or earlier. Few line pilots seem to have had inside government contacts who could provide objective inside information on the entire process. At least none that I ever heard of when the retired older guys were working here years ago. They noticed how our careers were not helped by White House favoritism given to Mr. Lorenzo from about 1980-1992 or so. The strong tendency of aspiring airline pilots to believe in the self-delusion that "rugged individualism" (the myth we absorbed from John Wayne movies) and self-promotion are more important than pilot profession solidarity have eroded this profession, being two very basic human elements which have been exploited year after year by many airlines and developed into an art form.
A bankruptcy attorney who was retained by our company told a fellow crewmember that their job during Chapter 11 negotiations was to make our jobs almost bad enough for people not to want to come to work (the present staff or the future outsourced?).Have we seen the bottom yet?
No 'patriotic motives' or political leanings can camouflage this reality. Two pilot interviewees were on the airport shuttle yesterday. After they got off, another older pilot here was surprised that guys would want to give up a Captain's seat somewhere to be brand-new again, face very hard work during Init. Tng for just $29/hour the first year, and not much more during the 2nd year (flying 100-125 seat jets).
Speaking of "Aviation Leak", it quoted "alleged"
pressure inside the FAA's Western Region to allow certain "irregularities" (or did it say advantages?) during the CO strike against Lorenzo in '83-84". The issue could probably be researched in a university library after trolling the Internet. The local one has good flight safety articles in the old "MAC Flyer" (now AMC), maybe copies of "Approach" magazine (these are often on the Internet).
"Alleged" decisions by former DOT Admin. Law judges who immediately went to work for either CO or TAC right after favorable rulings for Texas Air Corporation appeared to be interesting coincidences, as described by "Aviation Week & ST".
The so-called "quasi-private" PBGC and the ATSB are basically government entities.
Professional bureaucrats and attorneys might better describe this with the correct terminology and accuracy.
I earned my Private license in '78, then went into the AFRES, flying civilian turboprops in '83, then turbofans from '85 to the present. I'm just a regular line pilot with no legal or govt experience.
As our careers (in the US) race to the bottom, it is interesting that so many pilots seem to be leaving this country for what are apparently good jobs overseas.