Will United Airlines offer incentives to book with them?

[Mountaineer]

Leave it to me to fixate on the tangential details, but in the initial video showing the doctor being accosted in his seat and then dragged down the aisle, the victim was a sort of pudgy, white guy. Now the videos are showing the doctor as a slight-built Vietnamese man. These are clearly two separate people. What am I missing here?

White balance was off in one of the shots? Distortion lens similar to the carnival mirrors of old? Press making news instead of reporting facts?

[bedraggled]

My original thoughts: Is anyone on the forum avoiding United Airlines for the foreseeable future? Is anyone never flying United again?

BTW, Jimmy Kimmel's video on United Airlines was pretty funny.

[Maddy]

Ah, that last video cleared it up. My mistake. The very first video I saw focused on the pudgy guy in the orange shirt, who I immediately had pegged as a surgeon, then moved directly to the "dragging" scene. I now see that Mr. Orange Shirt was not part of the scuffle. He was in the row in front of the Vietnamese doctor.

However, I am concerned about the passenger in Row 18A, who bears a remarkable likeness to Adam Lanza.

[Mountaineer]

Press making news instead of reporting facts?

What basis do you have for making this assertion? The was video shot by passengers. Who altered the video then? Who else was in on the ruse? Why have no passengers stepped forward to say that it was not the same man?

Do you have any understanding of what means? You know, the emoji you left out of your quote of my post. I think you do since you not too long ago told me perhaps everything was a joke to me. Hope you are not losing it, or burried in your preconceived notions, or trapped in vincible ignorance. How's this? Are we good? or not? I choose to be .

[dualstow]

Leave it to me to fixate on the tangential details,

I think it's the same guy, but if you want tangential details:

Dao’s own medical license was suspended in 2003 following his arrest on charges including unlawful prescribing and trafficking in a controlled substance.

He was accused of providing prescriptions for Vicodin and other narcotics to a former patient he later hired as his office manger, who was identified in news reports at the time as Brian Case.

The men repeatedly hooked up in motels, with Dao paying Case around $200 each time and also sharing in the drugs, according to a 130-page file compiled by the Kentucky Board of Medical Licensure.

http://nypost.com/2017/04/11/doctor-dra ... s-for-sex/

[Maddy]

This morning there was a retraction. Seems that there are two doctors with the same name in the same vicinity. But that won't be of much consolation when half of this doctor's patients disappear.

So this guy's now got a defamation suit as well.

[dualstow]

This morning there was a retraction. Seems that there are two doctors with the same name in the same vicinity. But that won't be of much consolation when half of this doctor's patients disappear regardless.

So this guy's now got a defamation suit as well.

Ah! My wife said the same thing on the way to the grocery store, but then said she wasn't sure.
This story gets curiouser and curiouser.

[Tyler]

This morning there was a retraction. Seems that there are two doctors with the same name in the same vicinity. But that won't be of much consolation when half of this doctor's patients disappear.

So this guy's now got a defamation suit as well.

Wow.

So it's death by suicide for both the airline and the media that covered it. What a world we live in.

[farjean2]

My original thoughts: Is anyone on the forum avoiding United Airlines for the foreseeable future? Is anyone never flying United again?

As I said in an earlier post, we're going to Australia in September and if this fiasco results in a good deal on United Tickets I will probably go for it. They were already quoting the lowest price according to Google.

I don't see much point in boycotting them over this incident. Is there a major American carrier that treats customers any better? I had my own issues with American Airlines the last time I flew overseas and I've also heard bad things about Delta. On domestic flights I usually fly Southwest but they don't fly to Australia.

Now if I get a competitive price from New Zealand Air or Qantas, or some other non-U.S. airlines I might consider it.

[bedraggled]

Farjean2,

Thanks. I would love to fly first class to Europe for $800 round trip. If United can do that, life is OK. First class passengers seem to enjoy the ride more, too.

[Jack Jones]

I feel like this article covered the issues very well:

http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2017/04/ ... -fail.html

tldr: United didn't have the right to eject the passenger.

[farjean2]

Farjean2,
First class passengers seem to enjoy the ride more, too.

No doubt about that. Every time I take a long international flight I look at the people up in first/business class with envy and I'm just talking about being able to lie down and go to sleep. Don't really care that much about the rest of it.

Checking on the Australia trip, the price was $32k for first class as opposed to about $3.2k for economy for the two of us. Sorry, it's not worth that much to avoid 18 hours of misery.

[Mountaineer]

What basis do you have for making this assertion? The was video shot by passengers. Who altered the video then? Who else was in on the ruse? Why have no passengers stepped forward to say that it was not the same man?

Do you have any understanding of what means? You know, the emoji you left out of your quote of my post. I think you do since you not too long ago told me perhaps everything was a joke to me. Hope you are not losing it, or buried in your preconceived notions, or trapped in vincible ignorance. How's this? Are we good? or not? I choose to be .

Yeah, I saw the wink, but, to be honest, I wasn't exactly sure what the humor angle was in your post. Plus, my experience is that you will often include winks/emoji when trying to soften a serious point.

So, are we good? (no emoji)

[Xan]

I feel like this article covered the issues very well:

http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2017/04/ ... -fail.html

tldr: United didn't have the right to eject the passenger.

That is a fantastic article, Jack. And it's not even really an opinion piece; it's one of the few bits of actual investigative reporting about this incident that I've seen.

[WiseOne]

Really enjoyable read, Jack. It just highlights how lazy and superficial the press has become - not too unlike the United Airlines and Chicago airport security employees that had a hand in creating this incident.

I think the key observation in the article was this one:

Post-merger United is too big to fail, too big to manage and far too Balkanized to govern. I fully expect the ugliness to continue at United.

United can mistreat & squeeze passengers while reaping record profits because there's nothing to stop them. They're a monopoly, especially at their Chicago hub. Capitalism relies on competition to keep the wheels greased. No doubt this incident will result in a new set of regulations that won't fix the problem, but what's really needed is some good old fashioned, Warren Harding-style trust-busting.

Oddly enough, there's a lot more airline competition in Europe. There are a few People's Express type of puddle-jumper airlines there, like Ryanair, that I really wish we could have here in the US.

[Mountaineer]

Yeah, I saw the wink, but, to be honest, I wasn't exactly sure what the humor angle was in your post. Plus, my experience is that you will often include winks/emoji when trying to soften a serious point.

So, are we good? (no emoji)

Of course.

emoji.

[Tyler]

Checking on the Australia trip, the price was $32k for first class as opposed to about $3.2k for economy for the two of us. Sorry, it's not worth that much to avoid 18 hours of misery.

If you can afford it, the sweet spot on international flights is business class. It's light years better than what they call first class within the US, and a whole lot cheaper than international first class. For example, Cathay business class has seats that recline fully flat into a bed. From what I can tell, first class is more about insane levels of service and a "pod" that feels more like a home office.

[Libertarian666]

Checking on the Australia trip, the price was $32k for first class as opposed to about $3.2k for economy for the two of us. Sorry, it's not worth that much to avoid 18 hours of misery.

If you can afford it, the sweet spot on international flights is business class. It's light years better than what they call first class within the US, and a whole lot cheaper than international first class. For example, Cathay business class has seats that recline fully flat into a bed. From what I can tell, first class is more about insane levels of service and a "pod" that feels more like a home office.

Tyler, it's often possible to fly international business for MUCH less than the "sticker price", usually by making bank on frequent flyer mile promotions from credit cards. I'd take advantage of the free trial on firstclassflyer.com to see if he has something good to recommend. thepointsguy.com is another good site to look for tips and tricks.

[Tyler]

Thanks for the tip! Luckily I don't fly much any more, but the next time I do I'll check it out.

Even when the company wouldn't spring for business class, I had enough status that I'd occasionally get bumped into it for free at the gate when they wanted to fill out the main cabin. That was always a nice surprise.

[Libertarian666]

Thanks for the tip! Luckily I don't fly much any more, but the next time I do I'll check it out.

Even when the company wouldn't spring for business class, I had enough status that I'd occasionally get bumped into it for free at the gate when they wanted to fill out the main cabin. That was always a nice surprise.

I've never had that good fortune. Getting into the business cabin going back and forth to South America took a lot of planning and research, as well as a fair amount of money, but I did it on two very long trips (Argentina and Uruguay).

[dualstow]

I feel like this article covered the issues very well:
http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2017/04/ ... -fail.html
tldr: United didn't have the right to eject the passenger.

Very interesting, Jack. I learned a lot.

[WiseOne]

United can mistreat & squeeze passengers while reaping record profits because there's nothing to stop them. They're a monopoly, especially at their Chicago hub. Capitalism relies on competition to keep the wheels greased. No doubt this incident will result in a new set of regulations that won't fix the problem, but what's really needed is some good old fashioned, Warren Harding-style trust-busting.

They are far from a monopoly in Chicago. Every major airline and plenty of smaller ones fly in & out of O'hare, which is the second busiest airport in the US [used to be #1, now it's Atlanta]. Except Southwest, which only flies out of Midway.

You mean "both of them", right? United and American have absorbed most of the other airlines, or "partnered" with them.

Monopoly pricing can occur when there are four or fewer firms controlling over 50% of a given market. I guess technically you should call it an oligopoly, but the point still stands. This is clearly the case for airlines. I've read analyses of this same phenomenon in the food system, but none specifically about the effect on airline prices/services.

[Libertarian666]

The only harmful kind of monopoly is coercive monopoly, in which no one is allowed to compete with the incumbent company or companies. It should go without saying that this can happen only if they have the government to enforce this restriction.

Natural monopolies, on the other hand, can occur when there is one firm that is just so good at what it does that no one can compete with them. This is fairly uncommon but does happen; Alcoa is a commonly cited example. The only way that a company can maintain their natural monopoly is to remain so efficient that no one is willing to try to compete with them, or loses if they do compete. This is a great benefit to the consumer.

The airline industry is mostly a coercive monopoly (oligopoly) because the US government prohibits foreign competitors from carrying passengers from one point to another in the US unless the route in question includes a foreign country. Thus, British Airways (for example) cannot carry passengers originating from New York to terminate in Los Angeles; only US-based airlines can do this. Obviously allowing such competition would be very likely to improve service and reduce costs, but this is up to the government to change.

[Kbg]

Sorry can't resist (do not reply I'm just posting this for fun)...I'm sure it's another CIA false flag op because they are trying to break up the apparent Xi-Trump love fest.

[WiseOne]

The airline industry is mostly a coercive monopoly (oligopoly) because the US government prohibits foreign competitors from carrying passengers from one point to another in the US unless the route in question includes a foreign country. Thus, British Airways (for example) cannot carry passengers originating from New York to terminate in Los Angeles; only US-based airlines can do this. Obviously allowing such competition would be very likely to improve service and reduce costs, but this is up to the government to change.

The government could have prevented the mergers that led to this state of affairs. The result was easy to predict: higher prices, worse service, and frankly abusive practices. The only weapon that consumers have left in their arsenal is the camera on their iPhones, leading to random US senators calling for investigations.

It would be useful if a true journalist, if any even exist anymore, could have investigated the reasons behind these mergers. Perhaps it was creeping or post-9/11 over-regulation, for example. But I couldn't find any article even venturing to speculate.