It’s Time to Abolish the TSA

The congressional fight over funding the Department of Homeland Security has caused massive security lines at many large airports around the country.

Privatizing airport security could avoid this problem in the future, but a more radical reform—abolishing the Transportation Security Administration and its monopoly on security procedures—would be a better solution.

Congressional spending battles have forced federal TSA employees to work unpaid twice in the last six months. Many unpaid workers have called in sick, resulting in hours-long security lines at major airports. Airports in Houston and Atlanta each had more than three-hour-long security lines recently, and other major airports had lines exceeding an hour.

My family recently landed in George Bush Intercontinental Airport in Houston with a four-hour international connection on our way home. The three-and-a-half-hour security line caused us to miss our connection and drive a rental car more than 500 miles to Lubbock. I’m sure many other people choose to drive rather than fly because of these massive lines.

Airport security is supposed to make us safer, but driving is much more dangerous than flying.

Numerous commentators have pointed out that privatized airport security would avoid this problem during congressional budget battles. San Francisco and nearly two dozen other airports have private contractors, rather than federal employees, implement TSA-mandated screening procedures. There are no significant delays at these airports.

Moreover, the TSA has notoriously failed tests of its ability to detect prohibited items. Private firms that failed could be replaced by other contractors. Potential competition would improve screening. Private provision would be a step in the right direction because it would eliminate long lines and improve service. But more could be done.

Why not privatize the decision of how to screen? How do we know that TSA requirements regarding the removal of belts and shoes, the size of our carry-on liquids or the removal of electronics from bags are the right procedures? TSA bureaucrats need not take passenger inconvenience into account when setting their rules because they lose no business when they upset customers.

Sports arenas and concert venues all set their own screening procedures. To maximize profits, they need to assure their customers of security while minimizing inconvenience. Why shouldn’t we use the same market process for airport security?

We need the people who conduct the screening and who make the rules to weigh the expected benefits of a procedure against the likely costs in terms of traveler delays and dissatisfaction. Only the competitive profit-and-loss system does that well.

Most of the benefits of airline safety accrue directly to airlines and their passengers. So, if the airlines are ceded responsibility for screening, they also should be held strictly liable for any harm caused by security breaches. That would account for any costs borne by non-customers. Competition between airlines would help reveal the best security protocols.

Airline-specific security procedures are practical in large multi-terminal airports, but decentralized screening would be impractical in many smaller airports. Still, they could benefit by adopting the best practices discovered from the competition at larger airports while using private contractors to implement those standards.

The TSA was thrust upon us 25 years ago in the wake of 9/11. It has incompetently harassed, inconvenienced and delayed us long enough. It’s time to abolish the TSA and let market competition determine and provide airport security.