by Lucas Johnson

Abstract

The goal of this paper is to extend the discourse surrounding certain topics in terms of airline optimization which is defined in this paper as the ability of an airline to efficiently transport goods and passengers as well as accrue revenue from its airplanes relative to its total capacity to transport goods and accrue revenue. Previous literature deals heavily with the differences between LCC and FSC carriers as well as the importance of both customer satisfaction and operational efficiency for the ability of an airline to compete. The analysis of this paper is in the form of a panel-regression performed on a dataset obtained from the T1 Airline Summary Statistics form maintained by the Bureau of Transportation Statistics. This data demonstrates the relationship between dependent variables represented by certain metrics of airline success, revenue passengers enplaned, revenue passenger miles and revenue ton miles, with independent variables that reflect optimization in terms of both payload and passenger transport. These variables are influenced by factors such as certain measures of timeliness competition defined in this analysis as ramp inefficiency and departure efficiency.

Professor Grace Kim, Faculty Advisor

JEL Codes: L93; D22; R4; L13

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