The airline on-time performance impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic

Abstract

This paper examines the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on flight delays in the U.S. airline industry. Using daily data on COVID-19 cases and flight on-time performance, and controlling for product, carrier and market characteristics, we find that increases in reported COVID-19 cases are associated with reductions in both departure and arrival delays. Specifically, a standard deviation increase in COVID-19 cases reduces arrival delay by 1 min 42 s and departure delay by 2 min, on average. Our results suggest that despite the economic fallout from the pandemic, a silver lining emerges—flights are departing and arriving with less delay amid the pandemic.