June 7, 2006

Do the Wright Thing

If you fly much, you may have noticed a simple truth: Markets served by Southwest Airlines are generally less costly to fly to, or from, than markets not served by Southwest.

And then there's Dallas. Southwest flies to Dallas's in-town airport, Love Field, rather than the sprawling DFW International Airport northwest of central Dallas. Fares into and out of Dallas are expensive, because of something called the Wright Amendment, a 26-year-old law that costs American travelers some $4 billion per year, by one estimate.

There is legislation pending in Congress to repeal the Wright Amendment. Neither of Tennessee's two members of the U.S. Senate is a co-sponsor. Only two of Tennessee's nine members of the U.S. House of Representatives are co-sponsors of the legislation in the House.

That's a shame, because the Wright Amendment is protectionist, antiquated and just plain bad public policy and bad economic policy that keeps air fare into and out of Dallas artificially high, costing travelers billions of dollars. The average one-way business fare to and from North Texas is 48 percent above the national average.

American Airlines has a monopoly in 49 Wright Amendment-protected domestic markets that serve over 6.5 million one-way passengers each year.

What is the Wright Amendment, exactly? Well, in 1979, Congress passed legislation restricting travel into and out of Dallas Love Field for commercial flights with more than 56 seats. The Wright Amendment was passed at the behest of U.S. Rep. Jim Wright of Fort Worth - who, it would later turn out, was corrupt. The Wright Amendment makes it illegal to fly from Love Field to points beyond the four states surrounding Texas and also contains marketing restrictions that prohibit Southwest Airlines from offering or advertising the availability of any connecting flights between Love Field and any city outside the Wright Amendment "service area."

In 1997, Congress passed the Shelby Amendment, which exempted Alabama, Kansas, and Mississippi from the strictures of the Wright Amendment. Legislation passed in 2005 added Missouri to list of states liberated from the restrictions of the Wright Amendment.

Plainly speaking, Wright restricts competition, although it is competition that drives prices down and forces competitors to offer better products, services and customer-service to the marketplace.

If the Wright Amendment is repealed, here is what will happen: It will, very rapidly, cost less to fly from Nashville or Memphis or almost any other city in Tennessee and 40 other states direct to Dallas . How much less? A lot.

That's not hype. The U.S. Department of Transportation calls the phenomenon "The Southwest Effect," because it occurs so consistently and dramatically when Southwest begins to compete in new markets.

(Nashvillians who fly frequently all-too-well remember how high fares into and out of Nashville were back in the 1990s when American Airlines dominated the Nashville airport and even got the city to fork over a $10 million subsidy to help it launch international flights from London. They also remember how rapidly fares fell when Southwest expanded its Nashville service after American closed its "hub" here and shrank its Nashville service.)

But, according to the SetLoveFree.com website, which is pushing for repeal of Wright, currently only two of Tennessee's nine congressmen - U.S. Rep. Jim Cooper and U.S. Rep. Lincoln Davis, both Democrats, are co-sponsoring the Wright repeal legislation in the House, and neither of Tennessee's two U.S. Senators, Republicans Bill Frist and Lamar Alexander, are co-sponsoring the Wright repeal legislation in the Senate.

My congressman, U.S. Rep. Marsha Blackburn, isn't a co-sponsor, though the Republican from Brentwood usually champions efforts to reduce government regulation. U.S. Rep. Harold Ford Jr., the Memphis Democrat running for the U.S. Senate seat being vacated soon by the retiring Bill Frist, isn't co-sponsoring the legislation in the House.

Yet if Wright is repealed, the price of flying to and from North Texas will fall by half, according to various economic studies, saving consumers nationwide more than $4 billion annually according to a study by the Campbell-Hill Aviation Group.

Please call or write your congressman and urge him or her to support the Right to Fly Act (HR 2646) introduced in the House by U.S. Rep. Jeb Hensarling and U.S. Rep. Sam Johnson. Please call or write your senators and urge them to support the American Right to Fly Act (S. 1424) introduced in the Senate by Sen. John Ensign.

You can use the handy Write Congress feature at SetLoveFree.com to quickly contact your senators and congressman.