Abstract for: The Dutch Taxation on Airline Tickets: A system dynamics approach to model airport choice

In July 2008 the Dutch government introduced a tax on airline tickets in order to internalize the negative externalities associated with air travel. As a result of the increased ticket price in The Netherlands a substantial number of passengers decided to depart from airports outside of The Netherlands. However, after the tax was abolished one year later passengers kept using foreign airports. Because existing traditional discrete choice models do not explain this asymmetric response a system dynamics model was developed to model mechanisms of information exchange related to airport choice. The simulations show that the development of awareness of an airport plays an important role in the asymmetric response. Further research should be conducted to assess the influence of macro- economic factors and specific airline strategies.