A Note on a Private Property Society and the United Airlines Passenger Forcibly Removed

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ajax
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A Note on a Private Property Society and the United Airlines Passenger Forcibly Removed

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http://www.targetliberty.com/2017/04/a- ... y-and.html
By Robert Wenzel

In the comment section to my post, VIDEO United Airlines Solves Overbooking Problem: Has Cops Drag Bloodied Passenger Off Plane, a number of readers suggest that United had the "right" to evict the passenger from the plane because the plane is United's property.

I agree partially with Dr. Walter Block's comment on this:
Some people think that private property rights give United the right to remove any passenger from any flight for any reason since they owned it. Not so. Of course, they may do so to an unruly or threatening passenger, but that was not true in this case. The passenger in question did not become violent until the authorities tried to remove him forcibly, and improperly. In effect, this passenger “rented” a seat on that plane, and, as long as he abided by the contract (sit quietly, behave, etc.) they had no right at all to expel him from the plane.
This I agree with (except for the "improperly" part), but Walter also said:
In my view, United had no right to remove any paying customer to whom they had issued a ticket, merely because they were overbooked.

This I disagree with.

I take the opposite view and it goes back to Walter's comment about contract.

The ticket purchase contract has a clause which states a person can be removed from a plane because of overbooking. The great Bob Roddis even found the clause online: RULE 25 DENIED BOARDING COMPENSATION.

Now just because a clause says you can do something doesn't necessarily mean you should do it.

Stopping a person at the gate is one thing but after the person is seated it is another to toss him off, It's a terrible thing to do. If you are offering people $800 and a hotel room to get off the plane and no one is budging that tells you all the passengers were very serious about getting to their destinations.

I generally don't pay attention to the announcements when they offer money or vouchers to get off a plane but if I heard $800 and I wasn't in a hurry I would take the $800 and the hotel room.

To actually call the police and muscle a guy off is pretty insane and not good customer relations as United now surely understands. In the wake of the public relations disaster, in trading on Tuesday United stock lost $255 million in market capitalization.

That cell phone cameras have been around for a few years with users very comfortable recording anything that goes on around them, clearly, this was an unusual event. I have never seen it on video before.

In other words, we live in a world of disequilibrium where not all possible outcomes can be considered in advance. This was an outlier event.

That said, I guarantee you that United and every other airline is having meetings right now on how to handle such situations in the future. Airline shareholders are not big on $225 million in market capitalization declines.

In a Private Property Society, such an event would be fixed by the markets. If it was a major problem that was persistent and passengers were concerned, airline(s) would offer "guaranteed seating" where you would never get bumped.

You know, a revenue generator for an airline, sell both non-bumpable and bumpable seats at different prices.

But involuntary bumping really doesn't happen very often.

According to the Bureau of Transportation Statistics, a total of 613 million passengers were carried by the largest U.S. airlines for domestic flights and there were only 46,000 involuntary bumps. That's 0.000075%. Pro tip: Involuntary bumping is a very rare event, don't buy the higher priced non-bumpable ticket of the future unless you absolutely positively have to be somewhere on time.

Taking this discussion a bit further, in a private email, Rick Miller writes:
I have noticed a theme among libertarian commentators that the proper procedure from United should have been to offer more money until someone volunteered to leave the plane.

I wonder why so many are honing in on the airline upping the ante as the Right thing to do? Though that approach is fine, it is merely one of several possible responses that are available for the property owner to employ from the libertarian perspective- including bumping the passenger involuntarily per United's agreement. Suggesting that someone other than the customer and the airline should set the terms of the agreement cannot be seen as libertarian.

At the root of this is a misunderstanding about how the libertarian should feel about coercion- it is only disallowed upon an innocent. Ejecting a passenger can get ugly, indeed- but the terms were agreed to by the passenger. United was not in the wrong to deny the flight to the passenger, who should have left at once. United, having determined to eject the person should be allowed to do so on their own terms.
Miller is technically correct here. But in a PPS you are generally going to see peaceful resolutions to problems. No one is going to want to deal with bullies (except maybe other bullies). So while I don't see government setting any rules for private property (or doing anything) in a PPS, I don't expect the world to turn into a mirror image of San Francisco's Tenderloin district.

The United incident was an oddity and you can be sure at future flight attendant 101 courses a better way to handle such situations will be taught. Businesses don't want problems and escalations (unlike government police) it is not good for business. Hotel employees, for example, are very skilled at defusing situations. They are trained to do so.

If there is a problem with United, it is that since this terrorist scare and the birth of the TSA, United has gotten much too comfortable with the belligerent government backup whenever there is any passenger gripe.

I personally would like to see the TSA gone and flight attendants back to looking young and being pleasant.

And I really would love to see a PPS because that is when businesses will really respond to customer desires.

JohnnyL
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Re: A Note on a Private Property Society and the United Airlines Passenger Forcibly Removed

Post by JohnnyL »

There were multiple ways it could have been handled. Seriously, was the stock loss worth it??

They could have offered more money.
They could have shown him the clause.
They could have checked if others would have been willing, then blacklisted him from flying with them again (for a duration?).
They could have explained, then offered to help him with his flight, whatever he needed, making calls and new arrangements, etc.
They could have found someone with no checked baggage (don't know if this was related).

Sometimes, "right" =/= "best".

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ajax
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Re: A Note on a Private Property Society and the United Airlines Passenger Forcibly Removed

Post by ajax »

JohnnyL wrote: April 12th, 2017, 8:43 am There were multiple ways it could have been handled. Seriously, was the stock loss worth it??

They could have offered more money.
They could have shown him the clause.
They could have checked if others would have been willing, then blacklisted him from flying with them again (for a duration?).
They could have explained, then offered to help him with his flight, whatever he needed, making calls and new arrangements, etc.
They could have found someone with no checked baggage (don't know if this was related).

Sometimes, "right" =/= "best".
I agree, and the article above doesn't suggest what may be technically "right" is "best". United is getting regulated by the best regulators out there, the paying consumers.

Silver
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Re: A Note on a Private Property Society and the United Airlines Passenger Forcibly Removed

Post by Silver »

United could have also bought tickets for their 4 employees on another airline to get them to their destination on time.
They could have chartered a private plane for the 4.
They could have planned ahead and asked 4 other employees to work the flight.

I fly to Japan at least once a year. Due to my proximity to Houston, I always flew Continental until they merged with United so for the last few years I have traveled on United. I will make every effort to fly another airline this year when I go. That's my way of regulating them.

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Re: A Note on a Private Property Society and the United Airlines Passenger Forcibly Removed

Post by davedan »

My question is "who was the person that was going to get his seat?" their own employees??

if this guy is already in his seat, if he had already been assigned the specific seat at the ticket counter, or gate, why physically remove him from the plane in favor of another person.

Who is the other person? Their own employees?

ive heard of airlines overbooking a flight but not assigning 2 different passengers the same seat.

Usually employees would travel via jump seat. Why didn't United employee just take a jump seat?

When a pilot or flight attendant is riding "space available" to or from their base, some passengers refer to it as "deadheading." Under "space available" rules, they get a seat only if there is one open when all passengers are accommodated.
Last edited by davedan on April 12th, 2017, 9:09 am, edited 1 time in total.

Silver
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Re: A Note on a Private Property Society and the United Airlines Passenger Forcibly Removed

Post by Silver »

davedan wrote: April 12th, 2017, 9:01 am My question is "who was the person that was going to get his seat?" their own employees??

if this guy is already in his seat, if he had already been assigned the specific seat at the ticket counter, or gate, why physically remove him from the plane in favor of another person.

Who is the other person? Their own employees?

ive heard of airlines overbooking a flight but not assigning 2 different passengers the same seat.

Usually employees would travel via jump seat. Why didn't United employee just take a jump seat?
There were 4 United employees, too many for the jump seat.

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Re: A Note on a Private Property Society and the United Airlines Passenger Forcibly Removed

Post by davedan »

https://www.usatoday.com/story/travel/f ... /100331782


United says not "overbooked" But maybe full.

United may have a right to remove a passenger, but they have the right to get hammered in the media, social media, stock price, lost ticket sales, etc for exercising that right.

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Rose Garden
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Re: A Note on a Private Property Society and the United Airlines Passenger Forcibly Removed

Post by Rose Garden »

What I'm wondering is why there is not discussion going on about the appropriateness of overbooking. When I book an airline ticket, it seems to me that they tell me the fare is unrefundable unless I pay another hefty fee to make it refundable. Are airlines really losing a significant amount of money on unfilled seats? Isn't overbooking technically a type of fraud? Why are we allowing that to happen at all?

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ajax
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Re: A Note on a Private Property Society and the United Airlines Passenger Forcibly Removed

Post by ajax »

It's called fractional reserve booking.

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h_p
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Re: A Note on a Private Property Society and the United Airlines Passenger Forcibly Removed

Post by h_p »

I wonder what things were like on that plane when the United employee boarded and sat down in that guy's seat. I wonder if he or she knew what went on in order for them to sit there.

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Re: A Note on a Private Property Society and the United Airlines Passenger Forcibly Removed

Post by Silver »

h_p wrote: April 12th, 2017, 10:22 am I wonder what things were like on that plane when the United employee boarded and sat down in that guy's seat. I wonder if he or she knew what went on in order for them to sit there.
I figure they saw the airport police drag a bloody guy off the plane.

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Re: A Note on a Private Property Society and the United Airlines Passenger Forcibly Removed

Post by Rose Garden »

h_p wrote: April 12th, 2017, 10:22 am I wonder what things were like on that plane when the United employee boarded and sat down in that guy's seat. I wonder if he or she knew what went on in order for them to sit there.
Yeah, can you imagine all the dirty stares he/she got? Yikes! I would not want to be him/her.

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ajax
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Re: A Note on a Private Property Society and the United Airlines Passenger Forcibly Removed

Post by ajax »

United Airlines and Its Private Property Society Type Reaction
http://www.targetliberty.com/2017/04/un ... ivate.html
Without any government decree or legal obligation to do so, United Airlines has changed its passenger removal policy.

The chief executive of United Airlines said the carrier will no longer ask police to remove passengers from full flights after the uproar over a man who was dragged off a plane by airport police in Chicago.

In an interview with ABC's "Good Morning America" aired this morning, Oscar Munoz said he felt "ashamed" watching video of the man being forced off the jet. He has promised to review the airline's passenger-removal policy.

"That is not who our family at United is," he said. "This will never happen again on a United flight. That's my promise."

In the future, law enforcement will not be involved in removing a "booked, paid, seated passenger," Munoz said. "We can't do that."

Got that? Just like in a Private Property Society where a firm or individual would be allowed to do absurd things on their property, it is generally not going to happen, since, especially in the case of businesses, people would stay away. Businesses will adjust to sane policies.

And if in a PPS there are people who are doing quite insane things on their property, people are just going to avoid those properties, just like they avoid bad parts of town now.

It is quite bizarre to object to PPS on reasoning along the lines, "You mean you would allow airlines to throw people off?" Just because you don't have a government prohibiting an activity doesn't mean that most people aren't going to act civil and humane.

To call for government to protect against crazies who do crazy things on their own property is opening the door for government regulation on all sorts of things deemed crazy by others. If you think someone is acting crazy, just stay away from their property.

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David13
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Re: A Note on a Private Property Society and the United Airlines Passenger Forcibly Removed

Post by David13 »

Myself, I would have just got off the plane. I know it's their plane and they should be able to do with it what they want.
However, they would owe me. So ...
But I would not have got in a big fight over it, and cause a real hassle, and hold up all the other passengers on the plane.
dc

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harakim
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Re: A Note on a Private Property Society and the United Airlines Passenger Forcibly Removed

Post by harakim »

I echo David's sentiment

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