All Posts Tagged With: "air travel"
Going to Graceland
A recent trip to Memphis took me to Elvis Presley’s famed home, Graceland. Touring Presley’s mansion and its grounds is fascinating for fans of his music, and the Presley estate has done a marvelous job in capturing his music and life. But visiting Graceland mostly interested me as an economist. Walking through the home of [...]
4Jan2012 | Andrew P. Morriss | 9 comments | ContinuedThe TSA Makes Us Safer?
We both have contributed to the debate about the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) since the furor erupted over the new “enhanced pat-downs” and backscatter scanners, which some call “porno scanners.” This debate has shown how few are the real defenders of liberty, since even the “liberal” media have lined up with the government. The debate [...]
24Feb2011 | and Steven Horwitz | 2 comments | ContinuedThe Decline in Civil Liberties
On a flight from Chicago to Washington, D.C., in 1981, I sat beside a U.S. foreign service officer who had just finished a stint in Moscow. He told me that although he had enjoyed the job, he needed to get his family back to America because he wanted his children to grow up understanding what [...]
25Aug2010 | David R. Henderson | 6 comments | ContinuedWhole-Body Imaging: Intrusion Without Security
Every time the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) fails to protect aviation, as it did when it allowed Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab to board a plane last Christmas Day, it punishes passengers with further restrictions and humiliations. Now the agency wants to virtually strip-search us with whole-body imagers. These gizmos peer through clothing to the skin beneath [...]
19Apr2010 | Becky Akers | 8 comments | ContinuedA Different Story
In the days when there was still a pretense that the public school system was actually concerned with education, one of the main elements of instruction was to make sure that pupils could remember a series of important historical dates and their significance. It was thought that everyone should know why dates such as 1492, [...]
1Jan2007 | Stephen Davies | 2 comments | ContinuedThe Futility of the Government Airline Bailout
In recent years many airlines have struggled, and following
9/11 Congress passed a massive aid package aimed at rescuing the industry. After years of government aid it is appropriate to ask what has been accomplished.
Thoughts of Miracles on the Plane
William Zieburtz is a dad, economist, and frequent traveler residing in Atlanta, Georgia. I am right now flying through the air. It is just me, just regular old me, just my mother’s son, and yet I am flying 37,000 feet above the ground. It seems miraculous, and miracles give rise to questions. The first being—what [...]
1Dec2003 | William B. Zieburtz Jr. | 1 comment | ContinuedLessons from the First Airplane
Mark your calendars! Prepare for commemorative events and feature stories in newspapers all across America. The date is December 17, 2003—the 100th anniversary of the first manned flight at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, a feat engineered by two brothers named Wright. In one century the airplane went from a dream to a multibillion-dollar industry that [...]
1Jul2003 | Lawrence W. Reed | 0 comments | ContinuedThe Pentagon Ramps Up the War on Privacy
David Brown is a freelance writer and editor. This is the first of two parts. [Editor's Note: As we went to press the U.S. Congress had hampered the Defense Department's ability to carry out the threat to privacy discussed in the following article. Under the provision adopted the Pentagon cannot proceed until it assesses for [...]
1Apr2003 | David M. Brown | 0 comments | ContinuedPrivatizing Airline Safety and Security
The events of 9/11 underscore the importance of improving the safety and security of air travel. The government’s response to the terrorist attacks employs a command-and-control approach. That approach ought to be questioned. After all, it was the Federal Aviation Administration’s system that failed on 9/11. Why should we expect additional controls to be more [...]
1Nov2002 | and Paul A. Cleveland | 3 comments | ContinuedAirline Protectionism Hurts Travelers
In one form or another the U.S. government has regulated the domestic airline industry since 1930. The imposition of various rules and regulations has kept the industry from becoming as efficient as it might have become had it evolved in a free market. While many controls ended in 1978 and the Civil Aeronautics Board (CAB) [...]
1Oct2002 | and Paul A. Cleveland | 1 comment | ContinuedAnother Reason for Airport Privatization
Robert Poole, Jr., is president of the Reason Foundation and a long-time transportation policy researcher. Copyright 2000 Reason Foundation. In several ways, the specter of re-regulation of the airlines raised its head in 1999. A number of bills in Congress aimed at increasing smaller airlines’ access into major hub airports like Chicago’s O’Hare by giving [...]
1Jun2000 | Robert W. Poole Jr. | 19 comments | ContinuedA Mad Scramble at 30,000 Feet
Edward Lopez is an assistant professor of economics at the University of North Texas (elopez@econ.unt.edu, www.econ.unt.edu/elopez). Airlines have been taking it on the chin lately. Travelers are busier, delays are likelier and longer, airports are bursting at the seams, and FAA complaints have doubled. Last summer Andy Rooney stood up for all travelers on his [...]
1Feb2000 | Edward J. López | 3 comments | ContinuedPrivatize the Airports!
Waiting in long lines for everything from a boarding pass to a cheeseburger. Slow luggage delivery. Expensive parking. Jammed concourses. Surly workers. Small, dingy restrooms. Long walks from one flight to another that leave you worn out, with the only “consolation” being that the connecting flight is delayed anyway. All that may sound like a [...]
1Feb1999 | Lawrence W. Reed | 2 comments | ContinuedCountless Wonders
On a recent drive through an affluent San Francisco neighborhood boasting truly spectacular homes, I did what almost every ordinary person does in such circumstances: I wondered to myself, “What can I do to earn enough money to be able to afford such a home?” My thinking continued: “To earn such wealth requires that I [...]
1Feb1999 | Donald J. Boudreaux | 0 comments | ContinuedJulian Simon, Lifesaver
The real issue is not whether one cares about nature, but whether one cares about people. Julian L. Simon, The Ultimate Resource 2 (1996) Julian Simon’s unexpected death in February brought a major loss. With the passing of this noted free-market champion, humankind lost a genuine hero; the economics profession lost one of its most [...]
1Apr1998 | Donald J. Boudreaux | 2 comments | Continued-
The Latest
Contraception: Insuring the Uninsurable
Update below. Controversy rages over the Obama administration’s mandate that all employers – including... Read More
The Snow Plowers’ Petition
The following might have happened in a small college town in upstate New York… In a cold and snowy... Read More
Super Bowl versus Education?
In the spirit of Super Bowl weekend I’d like to deconstruct a Facebook status update that a friend... Read More
Capitalism, Corporatism, and the Freed Market
When a front-running presidential contender tells the country that thanks to Barack Obama, “[w]e are... Read More
Creating Jobs versus Creating Value
Picking on New York Times columnist Paul Krugman is one of the largest participation sports on the Internet.... Read More
