Deregulation led airlines to shaft their customers -- and then go out of business! But the airlines that emerge from bankruptcy probably won't be any better.

By Alex Marshall

April 16, 2005 | The impending demise of nearly every major airline -- U.S. Airways, Delta, United, Northwest and others are either in bankruptcy or near to it -- should fill travelers with joy, given the way airlines have treated us. Since deregulation unleashed the carriers' talons in the late 1970s, they have stuffed us into smaller seats and smaller planes, taken away perks ranging from meals to pillows, charged us capriciously and exorbitantly, routed us through cities we never wanted to visit, and instituted ridiculous requirements like mandatory Saturday-night stay-overs.

Crash and burn, continued