Is the UK Airline Industry Competitive Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Is the UK Airline Industry Competitive - Essay Example As the paper declares taxation is always a painful and complex issue with reverberations on all elements of the industry. However considering the relatively under-taxed nature of the UK airline industry it is possible that it will not be too badly hurt by the new tax although it might result in a decline in passengers. This essay stresses that this is a significant issue facing the airline industry at the moment. British Airways is recently involved in a struggle to resolve with union officials after it has declared a strike because of BA’s refusal to meet it demands. BA’s after failing to come to an agreement with union over its cost-cutting program now appears to be focusing on wearing down its employees. The company has done whatever it can from out-sourcing to using volunteers and claims that it has managed to keep a lot of its flights running. The impact of regulation on competitiveness is a complicated one. It is also hard to assess whether the regulatory environment will change anytime in the near future specially considering the havoc that lack of regulation played on the financial markets. What is essential however that changes in regulation will definitely impact competitiveness but may impact different players and stake-holders in a different way. If we take a look at finan cial indicators as a measure of the performance of the industry we can see that many firms have reported serious losses indicating troubled times for the industry. British Airways for example been in dire financial straits indicating losses far worse then what many had predicted and with no respite anytime soon.