Aussies Say No!

lately the Australians refused SIA's bid to fly on the transpacific Oceania-US routes, and it was no surprise to me. i told dad that we simply didn't have anything they wanted to give them in return. negotiation is always a give-and-take process, and you "win" when you think you've obtained more than you've given. but we didn't have anything to give them, and i don't think it was much of a negotiation or bargain, just some disguised nagging and badgering on our part (sadly), and it was very easy for them to say no.

an obvious solution would be to withdraw Qantas' routes from Changi to London and places far afield, but things like that are just not done! they would then deny SIA access to Australian destinations, and other airlines would go along, and soon no one would be able to fly anywhere anymore.

the route is obviously lucrative, since many people want to fly between the US and Aussie and NZ and back. right now exists a duopoly situation among Qantas and UA, and they naturally can keep prices high... you pay 25% more per mile between Sydney and LA than between Sydney and London, even though the cost of running an airliner obviously remains the same for both. Aussie-US routes make up a disproportionate 15% of Qantas profits, so clearly they are benefiting heavily from the market distortion stemming from the protection by artificial entry barriers. that is, the Australian Government refusing other airlines access into this market. in our case, the Aussie Govt is our only problem, since we have a total open-skies deal with the US - SIA, and technically Tiger and Valuair too, can fly to and from anywhere in the States. not so for Australia.

here's the clincher: australians, like anyone, enjoy flying on SIA more than on Qantas. and the vast majority of them would like the additional choice of flying SQ to the US.

as an econs student i personally believe in and advocate free-market policy, so i despise things like french agricultural subsidies and malaysia's stupid bumiputra thingy etc. haha you also see that MAKE TRADE FAIR and help starving africans banner on gurulai.blogspot. in my ideal world every airline ought to be able to fly everywhere it wants to, and what the Aussies are doing to SIA is nothing short of outright protectionism. what's worse is the sheer hypocrisy of their Government, which has stated "a commitment to open and free trade" repeatedly, and actually promised SIA the transpacific routes some time ago.


but i have spent quite some time in Australia, and holidayed in New Zealand too, and i really admire and appreciate the more laid-back and much healthier culture they have over there. whereas here in SG, everything's so stressful and insane, and in a word - competitive. unfortunately we have no choice; we all know we have no natural resources but people and blah, and we are not especially intelligent or creative people at that so it's plain hard work for us.

still, i feel the world could do with less stress and uncertainty and worry, and more than anything in this case i would not want Australia and New Zealand to become more stressful and competitive like Singapore. just because the world is getting more competitive because of globalisation and china doesn't mean the Aussies and Kiwis have to become like that also. free-trade idealism aside, i wish even more that everyone could be nice to each other and not worry that the other guy might take away your job. and SIA would definitely kill many Qantas jobs. most aussies would rather keep these jobs than "have a choice of SIA on the transpacific route". their dads or brothers or daughters may well end up retrenched.

there was also an argument that SIA would bring more tourists to Australia, but frankly that's idiotic. as an American are you going on holiday to aussie just because you can now fly SIA there!?

it was thus simple yet brave of the Australians to make this decision. they decided to put their own interests first, as we in Singapore do all the time as well, and i accept that, and people ought to accept that too. the question has nothing to do with racism, as someone in the Forum page suggested recently; the decision would have been the same if it were, say, British Airways or Garuda or American Airlines. the question is about national interests - and the Aussies just safeguarded theirs, just as we safeguarded ours when we hanged Nguyen the poor drug trafficker. life goes on!