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Comment by credo | Hacker News Reader

I disagree on both counts.

1. Costs: I think the value of preventing a terrorist attack greatly outweighs the $76/passenger cost of screening. Besides, it contributes a lot of value to the economy by (a) reducing the long lines we have in our airports today and (b) eliminating the unnecessary intrusive procedures

2. Racial profiling: Behavioral profiling is not the same as racial profiling. Besides do you really think that the low-paid unskilled TSA workers don't currently do any racial profiling ?

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Can I ask how are you comparing costs here?

76 dollars per passenger is an obscene amount of money: look at the dollar totals. In terms of lives saved, the TSA is already a gigantic waste of money. You could save a lot more lives per dollar by doing hundreds of other different things.

$77 per passenger is a huge amount, especially compared to the cost of a cheap domestic flight. But what is the hidden cost of the clusterfuck that American airports are becoming?

I would gladly pay an extra $38 per flight if it meant going through a sane, competent, and, if not pleasant, at least not overtly hostile system.

Why not even make it opt in?

Ticket price plus a 38 dollar "treat me like a human being" tax.

I'd pay it.

What has it come to when we have to pay more, just to be treated as humans?

Capitalism?

I'm pretty sure that is the idea behind the clear pass http://www.clearme.com/

There about 620 million passengers in the US per year (http://www.transtats.bts.gov/), which comes out to $47 billion. In government terms, not that enormous.

In terms of lives saved, the TSA is already a gigantic waste of money. You could save a lot more lives per dollar by doing hundreds of other different things.

No question. In fact, TSA has probably on balance killed people by encouraging marginal travelers to drive rather than fly. But on the assumption that the general public isn't going to be receptive to a rational cost/benefit analysis, I'd rather pay more for security that (1) might actually be effective, and (2) doesn't involve naked photographs or sexual assault.

I'd prefer to use the opportunity to highlight the fact the TSA security is ineffective and that we don't need this level of security, even if it did work. Raise awareness and spend the money properly.

do you really think that the low-paid unskilled TSA workers don't currently do any racial profiling

I think they don't do much racial profiling. As a young guy of middle eastern descent with an obvious arabic surname, I've only rarely gotten extra screening. If the TSA were serious about racial profiling, I'd expect to get extra screening more than half the time I fly rather than on only 5-10% of trips.

On 1), the average person's wage is about $21/hour. Even if the average airline passenger's hourly wage is double that, such a system will still need to reduce wait times by almost 2 hours to be cost effective.

(Yes, I am making the dubious assumption that all time saved will be spent working. The economic benefits drop even further if you don't assume this.)

Half the people at the airport are working and the other half are buying things that are overpriced. If you think the economy isn't wringing the full value out of idle airport time, I have a Delta credit card application and a rental DVD player for you.

I don't think the average airport taveler and the average american line up that well. Someone making 7$ an hour is going to fly far less than someone making 70$ an hour.

That's why I doubled the average wage.

Yea, but I don't think doubling would be enough. Also the economic value of someone’s time is more than what they are paid. I get billed out 40 hours a week @ over 100$ an hour, but that does not end up in my paycheck.

Granted reducing wait times is not going to get directly translated into extra working hours, but the current system also cost travelers more than just their time spent in line.

Flights from TLV are minimum hundreds of dollars to Europe, over a thousand to virtually anywhere else. So $76 (or $38) per passenger isn't a huge factor, compared to domestic-heavy bargain-biased U.S. airports. (Source: http://www.kayak.com/explore/#/TLV?a=any&d=any&fb=90..., which only shows one domestic choice, TLV to Eilat for $90 minimum)

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