Consumer Reports
William McGee is a former aircraft dispatcher who worked in airline operations and management. Now a passenger advocate, he writes a monthly travel column for USA Today and is the author of Attention All Passengers: The Airlines' Dangerous Descent---and How to Reclaim Our Skies.
McGee is a former editor of Consumer Reports' Travel Letter.
Will airline service ever be great again? The "back of the bus" has turned into the back of the plane — with discrimination based on class, social status… and money. When airlines sell more seats than a plane will hold, they're allowed to force one paid passenger to give up a seat to another. Video of a doctor dragged screaming down the aisle or United Airlines plane is evidence of an increasingly common practice. And First Class isn't immune. With just four main carriers left because of consolidation, passenger service is a casualty of the drive for profit and America's increased wealth inequality.
Is American Air Travel on the Descent? On this first day of the busiest week for air travel in the United States, the airline industry has reached a new low in popularity with flying customers. Using the Public Insight Network, we asked our radio listeners for their opinions. We hear how the flying experience has changed as an industry with narrow profit margins struggles to meet public demand. This story was informed in part from sources in the Public Insight Network, find out more: www.kcrw.com/insight
Is American Air Travel on the Descent? It's been a pretty good year for the airline industry, despite those loose seat rows on American Airlines' planes. On this first day of the busiest week for air travel in the United States, now comes the holiday crunch. Ticket prices are higher, more planes are going to be full, and there could be more lost baggage. Combined with delays caused by the TSA, many air travelers have come to dread an experience they used to look forward to. Passengers complain that service is being sacrificed for the bottom line, but will they pay more to get style and comfort? What's the impact of airline mergers and the outsourcing of maintenance? This story was informed in part from sources in the Public Insight Network, find out more: www.kcrw.com/insight
Replacing Obamacare: Now you see it… now you don’t As the Senate deliberates replacing Obmacare, health coverage for millions of people is at stake. There've been no public hearings, and a draft measure won't be made public. Is the House version so unpopular that that Senate is hiding a version that looks much the same?
Janesville and the American Dream Janesville, Wisconsin is the hometown of Republican House Speaker Paul Ryan. But he couldn’t prevent the closing of the General Motors factory after 100 years. On this Memorial Day rebroadcast of To the Point, we hear what’s happened to what once was a model of American middle-class unity.
Terrorism and tweets, hate speech and murder Just days before an election, Britain is coping with a rash of deadly terrorism, and Prime Minister Theresa May is on the defensive. And again today, President Trump has tweeted criticism of the Mayor of London. Later, a double murder in Portland, Oregon has revealed the ugly past of a supposedly “progressive” city. One immediate question: is “hate speech” protected by the First Amendment?
What happens when America retreats from the world? Is President Trump taking his "America First" agenda to extremes, withdrawing the country from the international stage on trade and climate change, distancing America from its traditional allies across the Atlantic and even threatening to physically isolate the country through the building of a wall along its southern border? León Krauze guest hosts.
