Southwest has a model policy... perhaps we should just regulate that all airlines follow that. There is no rule which would prevent the airline asking the passenger to disembark if no second seat was available, if they have in their T&C's you must be able to put the armrest down.
Incidently, they might like to look at the fact they have designed in the problem. The first commercial flight in the US was around 1914. Through the wonders of google, I happen to know that people are on average 11cm's taller (Just over 4 inches) today than they were in 1914. In terms of girth, we are massively larger than over the same period. Curiously, the size of airline seats and amount of leg room appears to be in direct, inverse proportion to the size of the passengers. This is another area in which regulation would help. If the government regulated a minimum leg room in economy (I suggest 34 inches), on all flights over 2 hours, this would stop the airlines complaining that competitive pressures force them to do this.
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