Great. so what's the alternative, let them go out of business? That will help job growth. Perhaps we should go back to government regulation of airlines. I'm sure they'll do a wonderful job, just like healthcare.

Justice Department challenges American US Airways merger

Bart Jansen, USA TODAY 12:03 p.m. EDT August 13, 2013

The Justice Department and several states have filed a lawsuit to halt the proposed merger of American Airlines and US Airways.
The airlines had anticipated merging within months to create the world's largest airline to compete against United and Delta airlines. But the lawsuit will hinder those plans.
PHOTOS: The new look of American Airlines
The Justice Department filed the case in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia with states of Arizona, Florida, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Texas and the District of Columbia.
The lawsuit contends that the merger would hurt consumers.
"Because of the size of the airline industry, if this merger were approved, even a small increase in the price of airline tickets, checked bags, of flight change fees would cause hundreds of millions of dollars of harm to American consumers annually," the lawsuit says.
"Millions of passengers benefit each year from head-to-head competition that this merger would eliminate."
Spokesman for US Airways and American didn't immediately respond to requests for comment. But in defending the merger plans before congressional hearings, US Airways CEO Doug Parker, who would lead the new company, said few routes overlap between the carriers so that a merger wouldn't hurt competition.
The airlines sought to merge because of recent mergers of Southwest and AirTran, United and Continental and Delta and Northwest airlines. US Airways and American officials had been optimistic about their plans because the Justice Department approved each of those previous mergers.
But the Justice Department said US Airways Advantage Fares are significantly lower than American Airlines. For a trip from Miami to Cincinnati on Aug. 13 and returning Aug. 14, the US Airways Advantage Fare was $471 for one stop compared to $740 on a non-stop American flight, according to the Justice Department.
"By further reducing the number of legacy airlines and aligning the economic incentives of those that remain, the merger of US Airways and American would make it easier for the remaining airlines to cooperate rather than compete on price on service," the 56-page lawsuit said.
As examples of the benefits of competition, the Justice Department noted that US Airways tickets from Washington Reagan National Airport to Boston Logan Airport dropped significantly after the entry of JetBlue competition. Average US Airways tickets dropped from $366 in October 2010 to $236 in December 2010, or 36%, according to the Justice Department. The price of a walkup ticket dropped from $1,222 to $488, or 60%, according to the Justice Department.
Justice noted that the merged airline would control 69% of the slots at Reagan, which would be six times more than the closest competitor
"This would eliminate head to head competition at the airport between American and US Airways," the lawsuit said.

Obamacare Disaster Continues

This is getting worse by the minute. This delay is going to cost a lot of people a lot of money at a time when they can least afford it. When are the egocentric numbskulls in the White House going to admit this bill is busted and needs to be fixed. If the Republicans had a brain between them they would suggest some of the fixes that we're previously alluded to and do something constructive rather than harping on de-funding which can't possibly pass.

Yet Another White House Obamacare Delay: Out-Of-Pocket Caps Waived Until 2015

Avik Roy, Contributor

WASHINGTON, DC - MARCH 18: U.S. President Barack Obama (L) speaks as Assistant Attorney General of Justice Department's civil rights division Thomas Perez (R) listens during a personnel announcement March 18, 2013 at the East Room of the White House in Washington, DC. Perez has succeeded Hilda Solis as the U.S. Secretary of Labor. (Image credit: Getty Images via @daylife)

First, there was the delay of Obamacare’s Medicare cuts until after the election. Then there was the delay of the law’s employer mandate. Then there was the announcement, buried in the Federal Register, that the administration would delay enforcement of a number of key eligibility requirements for the law’s health insurance subsidies, relying on the “honor system” instead. Now comes word that another costly provision of the health law—its caps on out-of-pocket insurance costs—will be delayed for one more year.
Obamacare contains a blizzard of mandates and regulations that will make health insurance more costly. One of the most significant is its caps on out-of-pocket insurance costs, such as co-pays and deductibles. Section 2707(b) of the Public Health Service Act, as added by Obamacare, requires that “a group health plan and a health insurance issuer offering group or individual health insurance coverage may not establish lifetime limits on the dollar value of benefits for the any participant or beneficiary.” Annual limits on cost-sharing are specified by Section 1302(c) of the Affordable Care Act; in addition, starting in 2014, deductibles are limited to $2,000 per year for individual plans, and $4,000 per year for family plans.
Out-of-pocket caps drive premiums upward
There’s no such thing as a free lunch. If you ban lifetime limits, and mandate lower deductibles, and cap out-of-pocket costs, premiums have to go up to reflect these changes. And unlike a lot of the “rate shock” problems we’ve been discussing, these limits apply not only to individually-purchased health insurance, but also to employer-sponsored coverage. (Self-insured employers are exempted.)
These mandates have already had drastic effects on a number of colleges and universities, which offer inexpensive, defined-cap plans to their healthy, youthful students. Premiums at Lenoir-Rhyne University in Hickory, N.C., for example, rose from $245 per student in 2011-2012 to between $2,507 in 2012-2013. The University of Puget Sound paid $165 per student in 2011-2012; their rates rose to between $1,500 and $2,000 for 2012-2013. Other schools have been forced to drop coverage because they could no longer afford it.
According to the law, the limits on out-of-pocket costs for 2014 were $6,350 for individual policies and $12,700 for family ones. But in February, the Department of Labor published a little-noticed rule delaying the cap until 2015. The delay was described yesterday by Robert Pear in the New York Times.
Delay needed to align ‘separate computer systems’
Notes Pear, “Under the [one-year delay], many group health plans will be able to maintain separate out-of-pocket limits for benefits in 2014. As a result, a consumer may be required to pay $6,350 for doctors’ services and hospital care, and an additional $6,350 for prescription drugs under a plan administered by a pharmacy benefit manager.”
The reason for the delay? “Federal officials said that many insurers and employers needed more time to comply because they used separate companies to help administer major medical coverage and drug benefits, with separate limits on out-of-pocket costs. In many cases, the companies have separate computer systems that cannot communicate with one another.”
The best part in Pear’s story is when a “senior administration official” said that “we had to balance the interests of consumers with the concerns of health plan sponsors and carriers…They asked for more time to comply.” Exactly how is it in consumers’ interests to pay far more for health insurance than they do already?
It’s not. Unless you have a serious, chronic condition, in which case you may benefit from the fact that law forces healthy people to subsidize your care. To progressives, this is the holy grail. But for economically rational individuals, it’s yet another reason to drop out of the insurance market altogether. For economically rational businesses, it’s a reason to self-insure, in order to get out from under these costly mandates.