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I say it can. In a million important ways. Some of the obvious upgrades we'd like (more legroom at our coach seats, for instance) would disrupt the economics of a downtrodden, not particularly inventive industry. Others are, frankly, impossible in a world of $100-a-barrel oil.

But some improvements would make our lives easier, declutter the air-travel system, and help blacken the airlines' blood-red financial performance too. Here are six really simple ideas—call them The Seat 2B Airline Six Sigma if you must—that would work if only the airlines could see the forest as they fly over the trees.

So why do the other airlines lard their fare structures with bizarre rules and mind-boggling complexity? Because their goal is to charge each customer the highest amount possible and especially sock it to business travelers, who buy at the last minute and usually can't hit the restrictions tacked on to the low prices. But the structure doesn't work: It is costly to operate and requires expensive and extensive human interaction whenever flights are disrupted by weather or other crises. It also infuriates profitable business flyers like us and convinces every leisure traveler that they've paid too much even when they have actually paid too little.

A much smarter way to go would be to sell only one-way fares bundled with a seat assignment. Airline seats can and should be sold like theater tickets: You're offered a range of specific seats, each priced according to its relative desirability. The system is more transparent, less difficult for customers to understand, cheaper for airlines to operate, and, in the long run, would generate more revenue.

A better solution: Make tickets genuinely nonrefundable. You bought it, you own it. And that's the key. Travelers would own the seats they've purchased and could do with them what they wish. Meanwhile, the airline's job is done and the revenue booked. If travelers can't use their seats, they could eat the cost, give or sell the seats to a friend, or peddle them on a secondary market. As sports teams have done, airlines could even create the secondary market themselves and claim a piece of the resale action.

If code shares were just a matter of phony advertising, we could keep chuckling. But these days, airlines slap their ID tags on and sell the flights of dozens of other carriers. The code-shares prove airlines have no sense of brand identity or desire to sell a definable product to their customers. They actually think you're too stupid to notice when you book, say, a Delta flight, but end up flying Air France or Czech Airlines or Alitalia or even Aeroflot.

Problems are legion with code shares: If the airlines involved lose your luggage or have a cancellation, each carrier blames the other and you’re left in limbo, bouncing back and forth between two unhelpful customer-service departments. It's even worse domestically when big airlines share their codes with small, regional carriers. Most customers have never even heard of the small airline they end up flying. And many of the smaller airlines have questionable safety procedures.

Airlines can get virtually all the of supposed business benefits of code sharing simply by using time-honored industry practice of "interlining" and harmonizing schedules. It simplifies a traveler's experience without making believe Froot Loops and Cheerios are the same product.

Airlines these days write the contracts of carriage to ensure that they have virtually no responsibility if they screw up your flight. Given the recent cutbacks in schedules and high load factors on each flight, you could wait days for a "reaccommodation" when an airline cancels or delays a flight. It's not right and it's not fair.

If an airline can't accommodate you as originally ticketed and can't rebook you on a comparable service quickly, they should be required to immediately place you on the flight of another carrier.

It's long past time that airlines adopt a revenue-based model for their frequency plans. Business travelers generally contribute the most revenue to airlines, so the frequency programs should reflect that reality. Hotel programs already do—and it explains why frequent travelers now increasingly believe hotel plans are fairer and easier to understand than airline schemes.