FWIW, in the US an airport doesn't actually have to use the TSA: the government can't actually quite mandate a single vendor like that here; there thereby exist private companies that operate to the TSA specification, and an airport can go with one of them instead. The airport in San Francisco (SFO) is the only one I have ever seen do this, using a vendor named CAS... and while the experience is mandated to suck a lot, it still sucks a lot less than the TSA as the CAS employees seem to get that they are just security technicians, not officers of the state (a distinction the TSA people don't understand, but also applies to them: the police at the airport, for example, have lots of jurisdiction over them, as far as I understand).
I don’t understand though, why upon learning the government does something poorly the first reaction would be to replace it with private contractors rather than demand your government does better? Some things are public services and shouldn’t be profit motivated.
Because it's generally been borderline impossible to force a large national government to do something better. It's legitimately easier a lot of the time to force a multinational corporation to change than the government.
Since the TSA is generally a federally controlled agency, you'd have to elect a majority of the House/Senate/Executive to change policy there to make it better, and literally no one will run for those offices with even a minor part of their platform being improving the TSA. Even if they had a position you liked about airport security, would you be willing to look past a difference on something like gun laws or school funding or environmental issues to vote for someone who was going to make the TSA more effective? If your answer is no, that's why people have no real hope that the government would improve the TSA.
Which only tells you that the issues with TSA are not politicized (in general). Which is a good thing.
So any government should work on improving the process if enough people are complaining and there are objective improvements to be made.
We don't have to think about which party to vote for to ensure eg. the government cares about improving lives of their citizens: they should all do that!
No government employee will get fired for enforcing the status quo or coming up with a new regulation that seems to improve safety.
However there is huge career risk to reducing regulation, easing up on "safety" rules, etc. And anyone who does that will be attacked and if possible punished if anything goes wrong.
Literally there is no incentive for bureaucracies to do better.
The problem is that such demands for a government that does better often go absolutely nowhere. As a result voters feel like it is easier to replace contractors than it is to replace politicians. Given the very high rate of incumbency, this isn’t entirely unfounded.
And what would you do to force SF to replace the private contractor they use for their airport if you end up not liking it? Your avenue is exactly the same as protesting against a public service.
If SF's contractor got caught killing a dude over bootleg smokes or kneeling on a guy until he died you can bet your ass they'd either be out or they'd be doing everything in their power to make people happy with them going forward.
But the article we're talking about isn't about homicide, but about much more pedestrian lack of efficiency and corruption (the price of airport food in NYC).
The government should do as little as possible. That they do a thing poorly is but one reason among many for them to lose the privilege of doing that thing.
> the government can't actually quite mandate a single vendor like that here; there thereby exist private companies that operate to the TSA specification, and an airport can go with one of them instead. The airport in San Francisco (SFO) is the only one I have ever seen do this, using a vendor named CAS
The following airports utilize the screening partner program: Atlantic City International Airport, Bozeman Yellowstone International Airport, Charles M. Schulz–Sonoma County Airport, Dawson Community Airport, Great Falls International Airport, Glacier Park International Airport, Greater Rochester International Airport, Havre City-County Airport, Jackson Hole Airport, Kansas City International Airport, L. M. Clayton Airport, Orlando Sanford International Airport, Portsmouth International Airport, Punta Gorda Airport, Roswell International Air Center, San Francisco International Airport, Sarasota-Bradenton International Airport, Sidney-Richland Municipal Airport, Sioux Falls Regional Airport, Tupelo Regional Airport, Wokal Field/Glasgow International Airport, Yellowstone Airport
