Operational efficiency versus financial mobility in the global airline industry: a data envelopment and Tobit analysis
Abstract
The events of September 11th, 2001 precipitated an almost unprecedented financial crisis for the world airline industry. However, it is not clear that these events represent a discrete, industry disruption or whether, in fact, airlines were already entering a period of economic challenges that would demand new strategic orientations on their part. This study investigates the structural drivers of operational efficiency as well as the financial posture of airlines on the eve of September 11th. A sample of 38 airlines from North America, Europe, Asia and the Middle East was utilized to investigate whether relative operational efficiency implied superior financial mobility (as defined by Donaldson). Data envelopment analysis was utilized to derive efficiency scores for individual airlines. The underlying structural drivers of efficiency were then investigated. It was found that the traditional framework developed in the literature still provided reasonable explanatory power for realized relative operational efficiency. However, the second stage of the analysis found that relative operational efficiency did not inherently imply superior financial mobility. As such, airlines that had chosen relatively efficient operational strategies found themselves in positions of vulnerability with regard to financial mobility and thus suffered the consequences in the post-September 11th environment.Download Info
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Bibliographic Info
Article provided by Elsevier in its journal Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice.
Volume (Year): 38 (2004)
Issue (Month): 5 (June)
Pages: 383-404
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Citations
Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.Cited by:
- Barros, Carlos Pestana & Peypoch, Nicolas, 2009. "An evaluation of European airlines' operational performance," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 122(2), pages 525-533, December.
- Halkos, George & Tzeremes, Nickolaos, 2012. "Measuring seaports’ productivity: A Malmquist productivity index decomposition approach," MPRA Paper 40174, University Library of Munich, Germany.
- R. Amy Puenpatom & Robert Rosenman, 2006. "Efficiency of Thai provincial public hospitals after the introduction of National Health Insurance Program," Working Papers 2006-2, School of Economic Sciences, Washington State University.
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