Financial Press: Boeing Should Charge Passengers Extra Not to Crash

Source: MPN

A contributing cause of the crashes is widely reported to be the lack of sensors and other safety features that Boeing sells as pricey optional upgrades, effectively creating a two-tier safety standard in the aviation industry, where airlines serving less wealthy clientele employ aircraft more prone to crashing.

by Alan Macleod | March 29, 2019

CHICAGO — The Boeing Corporation is again under intense scrutiny, as news broke of a Southwest Airlines 737 Max 8 aircraft travelling, without passengers, from Orlando, FL to Victorville, CA that was forced into an emergency landing after an engine failure.

All 376 of the aerospace giant's 737 Max 8 aircraft are currently grounded after two crashes — Lion Air Flight 610 in October and Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 in March — killed all 346 souls on board, leading to a public outcry and an investigation expected to be released imminently.

A contributing cause of the crashes is widely reported to be the lack of sensors and other safety features that Boeing sells as pricey optional upgrades, effectively creating a two-tier safety standard in the aviation industry, where airlines serving less wealthy clientele employ aircraft more prone to crashing.

The Southwest airplane in question was being ferried to a short-term storage location pending the inquiry. The latest news is more unwelcome negative publicity for the Chicago-based manufacturer, whose stock has fallen 16 percent since February.

Public safety as a "burden"

However, those media that pay most attention to stock prices have provided an interesting take on the situation. On Wednesday the Financial Times (FT) published an opinion piece arguing that Boeing is right to charge extra for safety features that the article itself acknowledges are “critical.” For the FT, insisting on a higher safety standard would "inevitably drive sticker prices up" and we should, instead, rely on the market to decide the appropriate levels of safety.

Wanting these "critical" safety features is a "naïve and foolhardy" wish.

It was recently revealed that Boeing charges extra for a second fire extinguisher in the cargo hold, considered essential by Japanese authorities but unnecessary by the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). Nevertheless, the FT presents safety features such as the $80,000 anti-stalling sensor system that could have saved the Ethiopian airlines flight and oxygen masks for the crew costing $6,700 as expensive boondoggles that, if enforced as standard, would distort the market and pass the costs on to the consumer.

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