Plain Sense Economics

I generally grate my teeth when I bother to read the editorial columns in the Wall Street Journal. Today, one of them had a dose of plain sense. When speaking of the current congestion at major airport hubs, the writer suggested

Meantime, economics offers a better way to manage scarcity: Use prices to ration capacity at peak times. Airlines would have to reflect the higher cost of the desired landing slots in their ticket prices, which would cause some passengers to shift their demand to less congested times. A Reason Foundation simulation with airline decision-makers confirmed that a fee increase for times of peak demand would lead airlines to reschedule as much as 15% of rush hour flights.

Just as deregulation created opportunities for bargain hunters to get more from the airlines, so runway-pricing would reward some passengers for flying at off-peak. The price mechanism allocates supply in all kinds of crazy markets. Why not at airports?