Abolish TSA? Privatize Airport Security? How About We Start With Eliminating Liquid Ban…

A new bill introduced in the US Senate seeks to abolish the TSA and privatize airport security. But before we “throw the baby out with the bathwater” couldn’t we start by ending the liquid ban?

US Senators Introduce Bill To Privatize Airport Security, Abolish TSA

One Mile At A Time notes that a new bill introduced by Senator Mike Lee (R-UT) and Senator Tommy Tuberville (R-AL) called the Abolish the TSA Act, which seeks to eliminate the Transportation Security Administration (TSA). Per the authors, the objective is to:

• dissolve the “bloated and ineffective organization”
• allow America’s airports to “compete to provide the safest, most efficient, and least intrusive security measures, under a new Office of Aviation Security Oversight”

Senator Lee argues this will promote safety:

“The TSA has not only intruded into the privacy and personal space of most Americans, it has also repeatedly failed tests to find weapons and explosives. Our bill privatizes security functions at American airports under the eye of an Office of Aviation Security Oversight, bringing this bureaucratic behemoth to a welcome end. American families can travel safely without feeling the hands of an army of federal employees.”

Senator Tuberville argues this is necessary to reduce waste, fraud, and abuse:

“The TSA is an inefficient, bureaucratic mess that infringes on Americans’ freedoms. It’s a bloated agency—riddled with waste, fraud, and abuse of taxpayer dollars—that has led to unnecessary delays, invasive pat downs and bag checks, and frustration for travelers. We need to focus on more efficient and effective methods to protect our country without sacrificing the liberties and freedoms of American citizens. The TSA should be eliminated and replaced with privatized solutions that are more targeted, streamlined, and where appropriate, accountable to limited government oversight.”

My Thoughts On Priviating The TSA

I’ve come a long way since the inception of the TSA from being a harsh skeptic (mostly on civil liberties grounds concerning early iterations of the full-body scanner) to appreciating how the agency has become more efficient, more friendly, and in essence, accepting of the tradeoff of inconvenience in an era in which there are more guns than people in a country of over 340 million people.

I think government agencies, like private companies, can evolve in at least two ways: over time, there can be competencies gained, lessons learned, and efficiencies maximized…or there can be resistance to change, lack of innovation, and perpetuation of poor customer service.

Prior to 9/11 I was not attuned to aviation security, but it is my understanding that private contractors had great trouble maintaining staff and of course, the system was not nearly as secure as it is today (and of course today it is still not fail-safe by any means).

As One Mile At A Time rightly notes, can you imagine if airport security was privatized and 90% of workers were laid off during the pandemic? Can you imagine how bad it would have been once travel roared back?

It’s not that I am against privatization: rather, I’m for efficiency and sometimes that is best accomplished by private actors and sometimes that is best accomplished by government, especially when a function is necessary. It’s fair to argue that some TSA agents are overpaid for the work they do, but removing the profit motive from airport security has promoted longevity and generally led to a very smooth security experience at airports large and small. That promotes efficiency and minimizes turnover that ends up costing even more in the long run.

Most importantly, we’ve had no hijacking or terrorist attack using commercial airlines in nearly 25 years. That’s no minor accomplishment.

How About We End The Liquid Ban Now?

Here’s a suggestion: instead of dismantling the whole system, how about we address pressure points within the current framework? For example, I propose eliminating immediately the liquid ban.

Let that serve as an experiment that would promote the objectives of Lee and Tuberville by streamlining security and also giving travelers more choice (airport concessionaires make a killing on bottled water…it’s ridiculous).

The liquid ban dates back to 2006 and while there is always some level of threat that liquids could be mixed for nefarious purposes, my own cost/benefit analysis weighs heavily on allowing liquids through checkpoints.

What if we start there and see how it goes?

CONCLUSION

It’s often said the enemy you know is better than the enemy you don’t know. The reality of the TSA reflects the evil present in this world…but I’m not at all convinced that the alternative will lead to better outcomes or even better customer service if profit becomes the motive for airport security.

I appreciate efforts to hold the TSA accountable and am not inherently opposed to privatization; I just don’t think it makes sense if the right balance of security and efficiency is truly what we are after.

Before we break the system that has been carefully built over the last 20 years, maybe we start by ending the liquid ban and see if that helps?

image: TSA