11 MAY 2017: Remember the 2009 ‘United Breaks Guitars’ story? The good old days – when airlines only attacked our checked baggage? The owner of the broken guitar, Canadian country singer Dave Carroll posted his song and choreographed reenactment of the incident on YouTube and, to date, it has had 17.5 million views.

This year, when real life, non-choreographed footage of a screaming and bloodied United Airlines passenger being dragged off a plane hit the Internet, the incident probably had 17 million global viewers within the first 24 hours.

Since that disturbing story became an instant PR disaster for not just United, but every airline that – on camera – manages to hit a passenger with a stroller, tell a bumped family with young children, “It’s not our problem” that they’re going to have to sleep in the airport overnight, or have a passenger arrested for using the bathroom when the seatbelt sign is on, it’s hardly surprising that lawmakers in the US and Canada have decided they need to be seen to come to the aid of their voters.

While the United incident unquestionably sparked the US government’s sudden interest in creating an ‘airline passenger bill of rights’, in Canada it appears a 10-year-old Prince Edward Island boy being bumped from an Air Canada flight is what got Transport Minister Marc Garneau working on a similar initiative. When questioned about the bill’s possible content, the minister would only say, “It will address the issue of what happens when you’re not given the service you paid for and it is within the control of the airline, what measures to compensate you will be taken.”

In both countries the bills can be expected to cover all the familiar issues like limiting overbooking levels, denied boarding compensation, tarmac delays etc., probably with some new twists like not being able to involuntarily deplane a passenger once they have boarded.

What the bills cannot legislate is that airline personnel apply common sense, occasionally bend the rules and generally attempt to be “nice” to passengers.

And there will certainly be nothing in there about passengers treating airline personnel and/or each other with “do as you would be done by” courtesy and respect.

To the latter point, something both bills could address that would greatly improve the on-board passenger and for that matter, cabin crew experience, is what has (un)popularly become known as “Recline Rage.”

As airlines seek to improve their bottom line by squeezing in the legally permissible maximum number of seats, the average economy seat pitch has steadily shrunk from the once ubiquitous 31-32 inches to an excruciating 28 – 29 inches. When charter flights and ultra low cost carriers edged to or below the 30-inch mark, it was begrudgingly accepted by most passengers that, “you don’t get what you don’t pay for.” Now however 29-inch pitches are becoming commonplace on all kinds of major carriers: British Airways recently announced, “From next year we’re making a small increase to the number of seats on our A320 and A321 fleet so we can keep fares low”.

That ‘small increase’ translates to a big decrease in legroom and BA passengers will soon be treated to the same knee cramps that they’d get on the likes of Ryanair and Spirit.

But paradoxically, Spirit’s 29-inch pitch may actually be less uncomfortable than BA’s. Despite causing a furor at the time, Spirit’s introduction of what they euphemistically dubbed the “pre-reclined seat” – aka the “no recline seat” – at least served to take recline rage out of the equation.

We’ve all been there. Even with a 31-inch seat pitch it can be troubling when, without warning, the passenger in front slams their seat into full recline. But when this happens in an already vice-like 29-inch environment the consequences can be downright dangerous. Fights between passengers over “insensitively” reclined seats have become commonplace – last week NBC News reported, “According to witnesses, a Southwest Airlines flight made an emergency landing on Sunday night after a man choked the woman seated in front of him for reclining her seat.

Here’s the deal. With ultra tight economy seating, that measly inch or two of recline serves very little useful purpose for the seat’s occupant and, when the person in front reclines their seat, whatever benefit there was is instantly negated.

So, if the writers (or maybe that’s ‘righters’) of these upcoming bills want to do something to diminish inflight discomfort levels for those beleaguered constituents that cannot afford premium seating, then impose a ban on seat recline for any seat with less than 31 inches of pitch.

Lawmakers might be emboldened if they read the Skyscanner.net poll that had 91% of 1,000 people saying short-haul flights should either ban or limit times for seat reclining. Furthermore 43% felt that long-haul flights should implement set times when passengers are permitted to recline their seats. Such initiatives would also fly well with cabin crews: Over 60% of cabin crew surveyed stated they’d been involved in, or witness to, arguments between passengers over reclined seats.

And when it comes to a bill of rights – why stop at airline passengers?

What about doctors who don’t give a second thought to keeping you waiting for an hour despite having a scheduled appointment? Or even for constituents trying to contact their elected representatives: My state senator is one of the people working on the US airline bill of rights so I tried reaching him in his DC office. After 35-minutes on hold I gave up – it was almost like calling an airline!