Yes, he is, Leo. Unfortunately, he is not always completely or accurately quoted, in context. This particular comment concerned network airlines' need to reduce what I term (but were not mentioned as) "structural costs", those imposed by the hub-spoke business model. The example given AP was Southwest, paying more for same craft and class of employee, which by virtue of its high asset utilization business model gets greater productivity, which converts its "high compensation" to its "low costs", which is what it's all about. I'm reasonably certain the network carriers are having another look at how they can recapture this latent productivity, but that's one of the steps they must now consider taking. They pricing environment has, for the time being at least, changed. - Bob Mann -- - R.W. Mann & Company, Inc. >> Airline Industry Analysis Port Washington, NY 11050 >> tel 516-944-0900, fax -7280 mailto:RWM@RWMann.com >> URL http://www.RWMann.com/ Leo Futia wrote: > > In a message dated 5/4/2002 11:07:39 AM Central Daylight Time, > psa188@juno.com writes: > > > > > Robert Mann, airline consultant at R.W. Mann & Co. in Port Washington, > > N.Y., > > isn't he on the list?