Airport Congestion When Carriers Have Market Power

This paper analyzes airport congestion when carriers are nonatomistic, showing how the results of the road-pricing literature are modified when the economic agents causing congestion have market power. The analysis shows that when an airport is dominated by a monopolist, congestion is fully internalized, yielding no role for congestion pricing under monopoly conditions. Under a Cournot oligopoly, however, carriers are shown to internalize only the congestion they impose on themselves. A toll that captures the uninternalized portion of congestion may then improve the allocation of traffic. The analysis is supported by some rudimentary empirical evidence.