Unintended Consequences Part 7201

http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2011/03/us_dept_of_transportation_data.html

U.S. Dept. of Transportation data show drop in flight delays, rise in canceled flights

Published: Monday, March 07, 2011, 7:00 AM Updated: Monday, March 07, 2011, 9:35 AM

By all accounts, the Federal Aviation Administration’s "tarmac rule" has dramatically reduced the number of passengers who are stuck inside an aircraft on the ground for three hours or more.

Violations of the rule, which went into effect last April, can cost airlines $27,500 per passenger, or $2.75 million for a planeload of 100 people going nowhere fast. In fact, there were just three cases nationwide of three-hour tarmac delays in December — compared with 34 the previous December, according to the federal Department of Transportation, the FAA’s parent agency.

But critics say an unintended consequence of the rule is becoming apparent and spoiling travel plans for a far greater number of would-be fliers.

Economists of the Austrian-Chicago schools (Hayek, Friedman, Sowell, etc.) would absolutely refer to this as unintended consequences.

No, the other Hayek.

To put it simply, the airline is impaled on the horns of a dilemma. Which do they do: risk $27,500 in fines per passenger at a cost of $2,750,000? Or lose $500 of business per passenger at a cost of $50,000 (minus the expenses in fuel and some labor hours on the flight as well)?

This is the result of a limited part of "passenger's bill of rights" - a somewhat statist concept that rights spring from the government anyway, but I digress... With bad weather last December at many airports, the regular delays and cancellations were magnified. But this isn't because of December, and this isn't the first time it's been noticed. Not by a long shot.

If the airlines were doing something illegal when airline customers were stuck on planes for 3 hours (arguably this could be the case), a simple prosecution and use of criminal courts would've sufficed.

If airlines were violating their contract with their passengers when they left people stuck on the tarmac for 3 hours, civil courts between the passengers and the airline would've sufficed - a class action lawsuit would result in the passengers getting that $27,500 per person, not the government getting it. Which is a better compensation for the injured party? To get $27,500 for the 4 hours you spent on the tarmac, your flight delayed, unable to get to your important meeting and to see grandma, getting cramped, listening to cranky kids and generally enduring unpleasantness, or would you rather the $27,500 go to a government agency? Assuming you had three delayed flights a year and were given that $27,500 as compensation, you could do pretty well for yourself just through compensation from the airlines. I'd sit on a plane for 4 hours on the tarmac to get a significant part of a house payment or a Mustang.

With the use of what amounts to a new taxation system, a cost-benefit framework is now established for the airlines. Now the airlines are forced by state coercion of extreme fines and thus the laws of economics to abandon flights as soon as the risk of fines come up, which screws passengers further. Imagine sitting for 2 hours and 45 minutes waiting to takeoff and then being kicked back into the terminal and your flight being cancelled.

It's like having your schedule stuck between two warm pillows.

To give a comparison on well-meaning government, consider red light cameras. They were intended to catch people who run red lights. What happens is they scare people on the penalty of a ticket - financial loss - into slamming on their brakes. This results in higher levels of rear-end collisions, increasing the numbers of accidents in one manner.

Red light cameras are frequently used as a revenue stream, and at least in Chicago, are used in poor black neighborhoods (as folks there are less likely to have lawyers or know the Mayor). In Britain, speed cameras known as "Gatsos" are frequently used as a revenue stream via creation of automated speed traps. Speed limits are recorded as being cut as much from 70 mph to 40 mph. The subject (not citizen over there) is inconvenienced, taxed, and all for "their own good"... or fines.

They are not well loved. The British solution is to toss a tyre round the beastly thing and set it alight.

This brings up a cynical question: are the fines intended to actually help airline customers - since a cancellation can be a lot more hassle than a long tarmac wait - or are the fines intended as a revenue stream, with the added bonus for politicians of demonizing airlines for cheap popularity?

A Quick Note On Airline Safety - Part 2

I mentioned yesterday that there was a simple solution to preventing exploding terrorists from getting onto airplanes. Dogs.

Janet Napolitano famously said "the system worked" and then began backpedaling furiously. Apparently someone pointed out to her that the terrorist was not in fact stopped by Sky Marshal Chuck Norris, and instead was stopped by a his own inability to set his crotch-bomb on fire and some Dutch guy.

Perhaps, if we aren't going to get dogs to search passengers, and if we aren't going to coordinate intelligence between agencies who are fervently waving red flags, we should try another approach.

I suggest TSA hire these guys:
It would've prevented this attack.

A Quick Note On Airline Safety

The Terrorists' Secret Weapon
http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2009-12-30/the-terrorists-secret-weapon/full/

The article mostly laments the TSA's inability to deploy some magical supertechnology that searches for airborne particles that indicate the presence of the explose compound PETN.

The article discusses the tech solution and at one point hints at the simple solution, but doesn't ask why it isn't used.

Let me make this as simple as possible:

From the article, where the writer doesn't seem to see what he just wrote:

Bomb-sniffing dogs can also detect PETN. Well-trained dogs can also sniff out particles left on a bomber’s clothing or body from having handled the powder.

Dogs and handlers work. Searches on people in the US are forbidden by the Supreme Court as government intruding into an individual's reasonable expectation of privacy.

The same does not hold true for people entering the United States. Nor do the airlines, who are allowing people access to their services, have to abide by the same rules as govt. If an individual voluntarily enters a service contract with the airline where the airline states "we reserve the right to sniff you with a dog", the problem is solved. Why? It's not the government (the dog and handler as extensions thereof) doing the sniffing. It's the private entity and the private individual entering the contract.

TSA, as a government institution, is by its very nature incapable of using dogs inside the US in such a fashion. TSA also doesn't check passengers and planes coming from Nigeria, Holland, or anywhere else outside the US.

The problem with this is that airlines will face the same nonsense that they did with the Flying Imams, a bunch of islamic agitators out to test airline security and sue anyone who said "yeah, those guys shouting "Allahu akbar!" are kinda suspicious". They were terrorists attacking us with legal means as well as physical means. They hoped to terrify us by accusing us of prejudice.

They hoped to make us feel shame for singling them out when they attack us. I'll liken it to having a toddler steal a cookie, and when the parent corrects the child (time-out, spanking, etc.), the child then accuses the parent of being mean. Any parent worth their salt will be an authority figure and not put up with that. A parent completely devoid of self-assurance will bend to their child's opinion of them and the child will have run of the house while the parent is devoid of will.

Note that these aren't statesmen, diplomats, negotiators, businessmen, or anything other civilized men (I'd say "and women", but Islam demeans and subjugates women). These aren't representatives of a state or a people asking for redress of greivances. These are fucking terrorists who want to kill people who've done them no harm. They're the toddler lashing out at their younger sibling because they know that hurts the parent.

But seeing as how dogs, like dancing, music, women, beer, short-sleeved shirts, men without beards, gays, lesbians, bacon, images of people (especially the rapist of Aisha), and pretty much everything offends muslims, there'll be some kind of outcry, and maybe a lawsuit terrorist (like the libel tourists) who come to sue with their multi-bazillions stolen from their people by being hereditary sheiks and princes.

If we ditch the "what will the terrorists think of us?" whimpering and just do what works, this problem would be dealt with.

Dogs are superb at detecting explosives, and especially with good handlers, provide for a very dynamic response to terrorism.

Even with all the other failures of the system - despite Janet Napolitano saying "it worked" when a terrorist failed to detonate his explosives because he was jumped by a Dutch guy - the addition of another line of defense would help to make it work - a dog would've found this. If everyone's so afraid of making a judgement call that they won't say "this dude's a terrorist" - even when the terrorist's father says "my son's a terrorist", then we need another line of defense.

Dogs work. Dogs aren't bigoted, dogs don't mistake a peaceful Sikh for a terrorist Muslim, dogs don't discriminate between humans - they won't overlook a white British convert to Islam and they won't harass any little old ladies. Their nose works just the same if it's Irshad Manji or Wafa Sultan they're walking past or if it's John Walker Lindh or David Hicks. They discriminate based on who's a terrorist carrying bombs and who's not.