Well part of it is that there's an oligopoly in the airline industry that prevents competition. First, it's a hard market to get into for new carriers (regulat

Well part of it is that there's an oligopoly in the airline industry that prevents competition. First, it's a hard market to get into for new carriers (regulation, high capital costs for planes, etc.). Airports also only have a certain number of gates, and until expansion of the airport, it can be hard to accommodate new flights. This is how we get to the 'hub and spoke' model of airline carriers, where it can be cheaper to fly through their hub city on a longer flight with 2 planes, than to fly direct. And if you're not competing with another airline, you're competing with yourself. This means lowering costs and trying to increase your margin, knowing it's a race to the bottom and people will have to fly anyway, no matter how bad it is. Basically, you may or may not be on a route that has competition between two cities. Or another way to put it, if Southwest does great (and I do love Southwest), why aren't they in every airport and on every route stealing market share by doing it better?