I expect more of the network airlines to do the same. Now that fuel is an issue, and other economics of the airline industry are pretty difficult, a lot of marginal flights are hard to justify. It's a prudent trimming of marginal routes. |
Latin America is becoming more deregulated, but there still is not a lot of competition in a lot of markets and there is no Southwest competition. |
Overall, I think they'll be OK, given that the economy is improving and fuel prices are starting to moderate. But nobody knows which way fuel will go, and to base your long-range planning on an optimistic view of oil prices, I think, is very risky. |
The reason they've been in bankruptcy for three years is because they couldn't get creditors on board, I think they're going to come out when they say they are this time. |
There's always a trade-off. You save money when you don't buy new aircraft, but then you spend a lot more time and money on maintenance as they get older. |
They are taking out some flights where they already have other flights anyway. |
They do it because they can make a lot of money. They're able to cut deals that move them to the front of the line when it's time to be paid. |
What it does is replace higher-salaried employees with new people at the bottom of the pay scale. It gets the average pay down. |