The cost, I think, is that there’s less air travel today. … I know that I have several times decided to drive rather than fly to a destination about 8 or 9 hours drive away.

And note that that cost is not just in time or hassle – flying is safer on a per passenger mile basis, so there is a cost in lives when people drive instead of fly.

There is presumably an optimal level of airline security which balances deaths avoided by preventing hijackings against deaths incurred by encouraging people to drive instead. Whether the current system is at that point is an interesting question.

n.b. that this can be a substantial effect. A recent book (‘Freakonomics’? ‘Predictably Irrational’? Sorry, drawing a blank at the moment) made a plausible case that the death toll from 9/11 was around 4500 – 3000 odd on 9/11 and 1500 over the next year as people drove instead of flying.

Why do I drive? The increased security is a big part of it. Leaving the pocket knife behind, the stress of the cattle-herding lines, the stress of trying to not delay the lines, while removing your shoes, taking your laptop out of the case, etc., etc., then reassembling your gear on the other side of the checkpoint. Then there’s the excess time it takes, having to arrive an hour early, at least.

The federal government took it over as a blatant power grab to expand the number of unionized governemnt workers

Yeah, that George W was a real union stooge. Please.

Aha! You took the bait! (I was hoping someone else would, actually). As we all know, defenders of George Bush’s War on Terror often said that the fact that there hasn’t been another attack on US soil since 9/11 is proof that his War is working. Others pointed out the ‘specious reasoning’ a la Lisa simpson.

Yes, it certainly is specious reasoning, as I will admit. Nonetheless, I believe that even today, most Americans prefer to have real government officials in charge of our screening that private companies.

The valid test of whether the new system of screening is a worthwhile (cost/benefit) improvement over than the old is whether, using the same testing methods, the system passes more tests.

By that metric, the new TSA driven system has apparently proven ineffective as it appears to allow the same percentage of test weapons and bombs through screening as the old.

But at least we have entertaining security kabuki to watch as we revel in no net gain in security, a definite loss of privacy and increase in cost, inconvenience and time.

The loafer manufacturing lobby also probably appreciates the changes.

Actually, small regional domestic carriers in the US don’t screen either. (For instance, there’s an unscreened gate on the bottom floor of the Albuquerque airport terminal for flights to small cities in New Mexico.) I don’t know the exact scope of the regulation, but the basic idea is that flights in larger planes or between cities of significant population require screening.

Randy: If this [the federalization of airport security] was nothing more than a power grab by the unions, then it was supported by the vast majority of the people because they thought government workers would do a better job than the private industry. One argue with this, but one can’t argue with the fact that we haven’t had any further incidents.

Homer: Not a bear in sight. The Bear Patrol must be working like a charm!
Lisa: That’s specious reasoning, Dad.
Homer: Thank you, dear.

byomtov: Airlines want a reputation for not being hijacked. Therefore they will institute anti-hijacking measures without government involvement. To the extent theese are ineffective, it merely reflects the attainment of an optimum level of hijacking, considering various cost trade-offs.

No, it doesn’t, since it doesn’t internalize the cost of hijacking to the hijacker. (Each airline, with or without government involvement, will struggle to find the optimum amount of hijacking for itself — considering the cost of hijacking and the costs of extra security — but that isn’t the optimum amount for the economy as a whole.)

byomtov:
It does sound stupid, Orin. I agree. But it’s not much different in form than, say, anti-OSHA arguments, or the like. I think you would be astonished at what some [people] believe about the power of markets.

There’s a saying that if you don’t understand your opponent’s argument, you don’t understand your own. If Byomtov actually believes that an argument about workplace safety resembles an argument about workplace crime, he doesn’t understand enough about libertarianism or about economics to be holding an opinion on either.

Nope. Completely wrong. In fact, this was the argument of Tom Delay & Co. when they attempted to prevent the government takeover of the screeners.

The reason the government took over the screeners is that after 9/11, many stories came out about the imcompetence of the screeners. Most were contracted under a single company that had close ties to republican politicians. The news reports proved that almost all the screeners were paid less than what you could earn selling donuts at the airport.

As a result, there were high turnover rates in these positions, and the people who took the jobs tended to be uneducated. I myself remember that most of them were lacksidaisical and could barely speak english.

So, after 9/11, the Dems proposed that the lives of passengers were too important to leave to a private company that clearly failed to prevent the 9/11 tragedy. Support for this was unusually high, around 70% if I recall correctly.

If this was nothing more than a power grab by the unions, then it was supported by the vast majority of the people because they thought government workers would do a better job than the private industry. One argue with this, but one can’t argue with the fact that we haven’t had any further incidents.

Toby: Not exactly, Eli. Airline workers could still put box cutters on planes today, where they can be found by passengers later.

Actually, I like having a single entity — the government — responsible for airline security. It provides a “buck stops here” measure of sanity, and if (when?) the government f*cks up and a terrorist comes up with a scenario that we couldn’t imagine, then I know exactly who to blame. It’s much easier to coordinate blame this way and throw the bums out.

Orin Kerr: I’m not sure I follow. Hijacking is the nonconsensual interference with property and security interests of another, not a market transaction: Does anyone argue that the market can solve crimes like hijacking?

I don’t presume to be capable of such an argument, but I imagine it would go somewhere along the lines of: The airline company and the consumer bargain for their respective safety conditions and just accept the results. After all, it’s in their interest to be safe (to maintain customers as well as their planes) and in your interest to consent to some higher degree of search conditions for your own safety. Or you could just take the cheap plane co. that doesn’t screen at all.

I’m not sure the two positions are mutually exclusive: you could find an airline with agreeable security, and also prosecute hijackers.

I can choose to live in a building with unlocked doors, with locked doors or locked and alarmed doors, and with or without guards who may or may not insist on retinal scans and cavity searches on entry – but still want burglars prosecuted.

Randy: Why was it such a fad to hijack a plane to Cuba?Is the food and music so compelling that you would risk the death penalty to get there?

Answer 1:Freedom loving people wanted to escape the land of capitalist exploitation for the Caribbean worker’s paradise.
Answer 2:It was the closest reasonable place to hijack a plane that wasn’t likely to extradite you.

In the bad old Saddam days, passengers could not carry anything–anything–on board an Iraqi aircraft, beyond the contents of their (screened) pockets.

Israel has been known to order strip and cavity searches of passengers for whom it had some level of suspicion. Many have been asked to take pictures of themselves prior to being permitted to carry their cameras on board.

India requires that batteries be removed from all battery-operated equipment before boarding. Batteries are kept in individually labeled bags in the cockpit and returned upon arrival.

Many countries require pat-down searches prior to boarding, particularly at times when there are global or country-specific alerts.

Now, these responses are in the result of the countries’ own experience with highjackings and bombings, so they have their own rationale.

And several others seem prone to circular reasoning. The US has manadated that any country that wishes to fly a plane into the US (or connecting to one) use procedures that match those now used in the US–so this is apparantly confirmation that the US was adopting some sort of rational world consensus.

Eli Rabett: Of course there always is DB Cooper, dead or alive?

Of all the hijackers during that period, Cooper was the primary cause of a specific regulation. In 1972, the FAA ordered installation of the Cooper Vane (or Cooper Switch) on all domestic 727s.

WatchingTheWatchers: Red teams are still pretty good at breaching security.I suppose security measures do raise the bar in the sense that only a more talented (or lucky) subset of hijackers are likely to successfully hijack a plane nowadays.

The problem with our current Theater Security Agency is that there is no price to a brute force attack except for time. As such, it’s pretty easy to buy full fare refundable tickets and keep trying until one figures out how to circumvent security routinely enough to actually pull of a negative event…

-Gene

Orin Kerr:
I’m not sure I follow. Hijacking is the nonconsensual interference with property and security interests of another, not a market transaction: Does anyone argue that the market can solve crimes like hijacking?

Choosing to fly and choosing a carrier on which to fly is a market decision. Why didn’t the market force the airlines to make changes to their policies? Why didn’t the market provide adequate information as to which carriers had the best safety records, thus forcing the less safe carriers to adopt the same policies or procedures?

This post was mentioned on Twitter by jasonmcclain: Fascinating history of airline security screenings ::: http://bit.ly/2Wmnm2...

Orin Kerr: I’m curious, what airports in the world do not have any security screening? Or has the entire world bought into this fashion?

I’ve flown through many countries and it seems universal aside from charter flights and maybe some regional domestic airlines operating in remote places outside the U.S. Even the 3 oz. liquid rule officially exists as a 100 mL rule in just about every country in the world although it isn’t necessarily evenly enforced.

Not my point. I’m just suggesting that the market didn’t solve the problem. Of course, if you think it would have then you are the answer to Orin’s question.

Randy: Why was it such a fad to hijack a plane to Cuba?Is the food and music so compelling that you would risk the death penalty to get there?

Some people were trying to escape from a workers’ paradise with an antagonistic relationship with its northern neighbor. Some people were trying to escape to a workers’ paradise with an antagonistic relationship with its northern neighbor.

A few wackos and a fashion for passivity led to the end of free travel in this country.

I’m curious, what airports in the world do not have any security screening? Or has the entire world bought into this fashion?

Does anyone argue that the market can solve crimes like hijacking?

I don’t see why United cannot hire an Air Marshall just as well as the DHS …

No thoughts on the changing rationale for the searches though? It’s a 4A softball!

I think SuperSkeptic does a good job of outlining the market worship argument. Airlines want a reputation for not being hijacked. Therefore they will institute anti-hijacking measures without government involvement. To the extent theese are ineffective, it merely reflects the attainment of an optimum level of hijacking, considering various cost trade-offs.

It does sound stupid, Orin. I agree. But it’s not much different in form than, say, anti-OSHA arguments, or the like. I think you would be astonished at what some peope believe about the power of markets.

Today, even though the use of my first name (I have never used it) actually endangers me in security scenarios (I don’t answer to it either), I am being peppered with demands to add full first middle last to all travel documents. If it is true that Al Qaeda does not like liberty, we have, at their bidding, given up a substantial component of it: freedom to travel. I remember when we mocked the Soviet Union for requiring internal passports. It’s funny how the left, whose troubadours used to sing about refusing to register their babies, (A Child is Born, Jefferson Airplane) will soon mock concerns about requiring permission to travel in response to this post.

“Necessity, the tyrant’s plea” – John Milton

Eli Rabett: Of course there always is DB Cooper, dead or alive?

Dunno. I never quite believed the FBI’s claim that no experienced skydiver would try a night jump in a rainstorm without a light source. Experienced skydivers have done all sorts of strange things, ie: stark naked relative work being among the least strange.

Cooper’s particular regulatory legacy, although less intrusive to passengers than screening, was the Cooper vane, ordered installed on 727s by the FAA around 1972.