Editing Airline deregulation (section)

==Introduction==
As jets were integrated into the market in the late 1950s and early 1960s, the industry experienced dramatic growth. By the mid-1960s, airlines were carrying roughly 100 million passengers and by the mid-1970s, over 200 million Americans had traveled by air. This steady increase in air travel began placing serious strains on the ability of federal regulators to cope with the increasingly complex nature of air travel.{{citation needed|date=June 2013}}The onset of high inflation, low economic growth, falling productivity, rising labor costs and higher fuel costs proved problematic to the airlines.<ref>Thierer, A. D. 1998, 20th Anniversary of Airline Deregulation:Cause for Celebration, Not Re-Regulation, The Heritage Foundation, {{cite web |url=http://www.heritage.org/research/regulation/bg1173.cfm |title=20th Anniversary of Airline Deregulation:Cause for Celebration, Not Re-regulation |access-date=2013-10-26 |url-status=unfit |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091019075701/http://www.heritage.org/Research/Regulation/BG1173.cfm |archive-date=2009-10-19 }}</ref>

Although it is generally recognized that the purpose behind government regulation is to create a stable industry,<ref name="Bamber, Gittell, Kochan, Nordanflycht 2011 4">{{cite book|author=Bamber|author2=Gittell|author3=Kochan|author4=Nordanflycht|title=Up in the Air: How Airlines Can Improve Performance by Engaging Their Employees|year=2011|publisher=ILR Cornell University Press|isbn=978-0801447471|page=[https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780801447471/page/4 4]|url=https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780801447471/page/4}}</ref><ref name=Kaps>{{cite book|last=Kaps|first=Robert W.|title=Air Transport Labor Relations|year=1997|publisher=Southern Illinois University Press|isbn=0-80-93-1776-1}}</ref> in the decades leading up to deregulation many airline market analysts expressed concerns with the structure of the United States' passenger air transport system. Concerns included high barriers to entry for fledgling airlines, slow government response to existing airlines entering to compete in city-pairings, and [[monopoly|monopolistic]] practices by legacy airlines artificially inflating passenger ticket prices. {{citation needed|date=August 2013}}

In order to address these growing concerns airline deregulation began in the U.S. in 1978. It was, and still is, a part of a sweeping experiment to ultimately reduce ticket prices and entry controls holding sway over new airline hopefuls. Airline deregulation had begun with initiatives by economist [[Alfred E. Kahn]] in the [[Presidency of Richard Nixon|Nixon administration]], carried through the [[Gerald Ford|Ford administration]] and finally, at the behest of [[Ted Kennedy]], signed into law by President [[Jimmy Carter]] in 1978 as the [[Airline Deregulation Act]]. {{citation needed|date=June 2013}}

Globally, state supported airlines are still relatively common, maintaining control over ticket prices and route entry, but many countries have since deregulated their own domestic airline markets. A similar but less [[laissez-faire]] approach has been taken by the [[European Union]], Australia, United Kingdom, Scandinavia, Ireland and select South and Central American nations.<ref>{{cite book|author=Bamber|author2=Gittell|author3=Kochan|author4=Nordanflycht|title=Up in the Air: How Airlines Can Improve Performance by Engaging Their Employees|year=2011|publisher=ILR Cornell University Press|isbn=978-0801447471|url=https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780801447471}}</ref>