國籍航空公司成本結構之研究

Abstract

民國七十六年天空開放政策實施後，國內航空市場環境歷經許多的變遷，航空運輸需求由急速成長而轉趨緩和，使得航空公司的經營日漸艱困，業者紛紛欲以降低成本之經營方式，來創造利潤並達到永續經營的目標。而在過去的文獻中指出，航空運輸產業的成本結構，會因航空公司不同的經營型態而產生變化，亦在構建其成本函數時，應納入不同的屬性變數，來詮釋不同經營型態間所產生的成本。因此，本研究即在探討國籍航空公司之成本結構，分析不同規模大小，不同經營型態的航空業者，其成本結構變化的情形，並歸納出成本結構的影響因素，再透過成本函數的建立，來反應國內航空市場之經濟特性。 本研究的研究範圍包括遠東航空、復興航空、立榮航空、國華航空、瑞聯航空與台灣航空等，成本結構由直接營運變動成本（包括直接營運人事費用、燃油費用、維修費用與機場使用費用）、直接營運固定成本（包括飛機保險費用、飛航設備租賃費用與折舊費用）、間接營運成本（包括場站與運務費用、旅客服務費用、廣告與銷售費用與管理費用）等成本項目所組成。研究結果顯示出，國籍航空公司成本結構的分佈，以直接營運變動成本所佔比例最大，且受到航網、機隊與班次等三項因素的影響；直接營運固定成本，則主要受到機隊因素的影響，以運輸設備價值的解釋能力最高；間接營運成本，則分別受到航網、機隊與班次等三項因素的影響，以航網×班次（飛行里程數）的相乘效果解釋能力最高。由各成本項目與其影響因素的關係中可看出，航空運輸業的成本結構會受到不同因素組合的影響。 本研究在構建航空運輸業的成本函數時，由於侷限於資料樣本數的不足，故未納入航網、班次與機隊等三大屬性變數，僅在成本函數模式中，置入勞動、燃油、維修與其他等四項生產要素，並以提供座位公里來衡量其產出量。所得結果顯示，國籍航空公司皆不具有密度經濟的特性，即不會因航線密度的改變而對其成本的降低有所貢獻。

Since the open sky began in 1987, the environment of domestic air transport market has experience many changes. The demand of air transport tends to get slack. The operation of airlines is becoming difficult. In order to make profits and manage to survive, the proprietors try to cut down the cost. Many previous studies show that the cost structure of air transport industry varying with the operations of airlines. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to demonstrate the cost structure of domestic airlines and find out the relationship between cost structure and the operations of airlines. Furthermore, based on the relationship, the paper will generalize the determinants of airline cost and establish the related function. The airlines studied in this paper include Far Eastern Air Transport, TransAsia Airways, UNI Air, Formosa Airlines, U-Land Airlines and Taiwan Airways. The cost structure consists of variable direct operating costs (it contains the direct operating personnel expense, fuel expense, maintenance expense and airport charge), fixed direct operating costs (it contains insurance expense, rental expense and depreciation), and indirect operating costs (it contains station/ground expense, passenger services expense, promotion/sales expense and administrative expense). The result shows that the variable direct operating cost, which is influenced by flight network, fleet and number of flights, has the biggest share in the airlines structure. On the other hand, the fixed direct operating costs mostly determined by the fleet is best explained by carrier’s value. Finally, the indirect operating costs could best determined by the number of flights and flight network. In addition, the research applies the previous result to build up a domestic airlines cost function. Due to insufficient sample the attributed variables (flight network, fleet and number of flights) only four factor input variables that include labor, fuel, maintenance and other inputs are adopted in the model. The result reveals that the domestic airlines don’t have cost advantage by increasing output.