This economist had the simple solution to United’s debacle — in 1968

[McFurd]

MarketWatch - 4/13/2017 - Steve Goldstein - If United Airlines had only listened to the man who revolutionized the overbooking practice, it could have saved itself from a public-relations disaster. Julian Simon was the brainchild of the practice of compensating passengers for overbooking. He was then a professor at the University of Illinois who came up with the idea in the 1960s. Simon, who died in 1998, wrote up the proposal in the Journal of Transport Economics and Policy in 1968.“All that need happen when there is overbooking is that an airline agent distributes among the ticket-holders an envelope and a bid form, instructing each person to write down the lowest sum of money he is willing to accept in return for the next flight,” Simon wrote. “The lowest bidder is paid in cash and given a ticket for the next flight.” That is not what happened, as anyone following the United saga will know by now. Read more @ http://www.marketwatch.com/story/the-so ... 2017-04-13