Some words on User Fees
Unsettling news wandered into my inbox today- news of the reemergence of User Fees in the midst of this junior high school dick-measuring contest that people are incorrectly calling a budgetary debate. What are user fees? Well, here's a quick run-down: You know how airlines charge you for your ticket, then charge you for each bag you check, charge you for the pillow, charge you for the tiny drink and disappointingly small bag of peanuts, charge you for the movie, charge you for the headphones to watch the movie, charge you if you didn't check in at a very specific time in a very specific way, etc? Well, those are User Fees. Their reasoning is that you're a user of their services, and their services cost them money, so you should chip in. But you know how those kinds of profiteering shenanigans make you want start biting heads off of kittens? Perhaps a sign that this is not good policy?
User Fees are a noble-sounding idea. We pilots use the National Airspace System, which is maintained and monitored by Federal employees, and since we pilots represent a tiny percentage of the population when you get down to the nuts and bolts of it, a lot of people got to thinking that we should support our own system and take the burden off of John Q. Doesntflyplanes. But the problem is thus: pilots keep this country running- especially General Aviation. Know those morning traffic reports that you find so useful? That helicopter is GA, and would disappear if one more cost got lumped onto the already high operational overhead. What about the cute new shoes you had overnighted in time for the big dance/reception/business meeting? Or the rugged new hiking pack you got so you could take that camping trip with your buddies on short notice? Wonder how it got there? GA again. What about the firefighting aircraft keeping California from turning into a giant barbecue? General Aviation. The Civil Air Patrol, who find you when you get into trouble in the wilderness? The Life Flight helicopter that saves you when you're in dire need? The humanitarian aid when a tornado wipes out literally an entire town? The conservation work done by our departments of natural resources?
I could go on, but there's a point to all this.
User fees are a bad idea. No, actually, not just a bad idea. They're a Bad Idea. The kind of Bad Idea that screams Bad Idea and then starts to spray paint Bad Idea on every smooth surface it can find while continuing to scream Bad Idea. With User Fees, look forward to yet another charge for the privelege of long distance travel. Expect higher shipping costs for basically everything. Learn to embrace not knowing what the traffic is like on your morning commute, or another five minutes of advertising to interupt your music each hour. Prepare for bad news if your house is threatened by wildfires. Don't count on life flight, and if you get lost in the forest I'm coming in after you slowly on foot- paying for the right to find your dumb ass be damned.
This isn't the first short sighted attack on GA- anybody remember the LASP that TSA tried to sneak through? Or right now in California, the lawsuit over 100LL? Aviation is a big, fat, juicy target for the nastiest of nasty political animals, and with the latest round of crises many of them are feeling cornered. So what do they do? They lash out at us. We're lucky to have AOPA, NBAA, and EAA looking out for us, but given the low and declining number of pilots our defenses are already strained.
So what can we do? We could behave in turn and lash out at them and their salaries, or their own use of jets, or any of a number of things that float appealingly in range of our anger... or we can get the the heart of the matter. Here's a fact: it would be ludicrously expensive to start up a bureaucracy even remotely capable of inefficiently doing this sort of a job, meaning we would either be taking a giant step backward at a time when we literally are almost broke, or we the pilot community would be paying the government (against our will) to make us pay the government (against our will). Here's another fact: there are already taxes on Avgas, and many of us are willing to pay a few cents more at the pump to avoid hundreds of dollars of increased operating costs per year. It would not require the creation of new offices and middle management- it would be an adjustment of an existing system that could easily be reversed when the budget is in better shape.
Or, the point I'm trying to make in the first place, here's a third fact: getting a pilot's license and never flying once after your checkride is (making some reasonable assumptions) more expensive than maintaining your driver's license for the entirety of your life. There are MILLIONS of drivers out there. Want income? Up the driver's license fee by a dollar. Make it two dollars if you're really strapped. Or heck, make it five- it's going to wind up being pocket change for individuals and a bunch of revenue for the public. I know it won't be popular. Many drivers seem to think that roads fall out of the sky- a gift from God. But really? Five bucks is unacceptable, as much as we drive? Per mile it's miniscule. Yearly, I bet we find enough change lying on the ground to pay it happily. Or scrap the whole idea and tax cigarettes, alcohol, porn, etc. Or pot, the 1920s-era-booze of our generation. Hold a bake sale. Take us up on our offer to pay another 20 cents at the FBO. For cripes' sakes, do something, but don't kill American aviation.
If you're a pilot and you're reading this, start writing letters, and don't stop until mentioning the words User Fees is punishable by mandatory flight training in Europe. If you're not a pilot, do some research and then follow suite. We can't let Bad Ideas live in our policies. Save our skies.
-Your pilot friend
User Fees are a noble-sounding idea. We pilots use the National Airspace System, which is maintained and monitored by Federal employees, and since we pilots represent a tiny percentage of the population when you get down to the nuts and bolts of it, a lot of people got to thinking that we should support our own system and take the burden off of John Q. Doesntflyplanes. But the problem is thus: pilots keep this country running- especially General Aviation. Know those morning traffic reports that you find so useful? That helicopter is GA, and would disappear if one more cost got lumped onto the already high operational overhead. What about the cute new shoes you had overnighted in time for the big dance/reception/business meeting? Or the rugged new hiking pack you got so you could take that camping trip with your buddies on short notice? Wonder how it got there? GA again. What about the firefighting aircraft keeping California from turning into a giant barbecue? General Aviation. The Civil Air Patrol, who find you when you get into trouble in the wilderness? The Life Flight helicopter that saves you when you're in dire need? The humanitarian aid when a tornado wipes out literally an entire town? The conservation work done by our departments of natural resources?
I could go on, but there's a point to all this.
User fees are a bad idea. No, actually, not just a bad idea. They're a Bad Idea. The kind of Bad Idea that screams Bad Idea and then starts to spray paint Bad Idea on every smooth surface it can find while continuing to scream Bad Idea. With User Fees, look forward to yet another charge for the privelege of long distance travel. Expect higher shipping costs for basically everything. Learn to embrace not knowing what the traffic is like on your morning commute, or another five minutes of advertising to interupt your music each hour. Prepare for bad news if your house is threatened by wildfires. Don't count on life flight, and if you get lost in the forest I'm coming in after you slowly on foot- paying for the right to find your dumb ass be damned.
This isn't the first short sighted attack on GA- anybody remember the LASP that TSA tried to sneak through? Or right now in California, the lawsuit over 100LL? Aviation is a big, fat, juicy target for the nastiest of nasty political animals, and with the latest round of crises many of them are feeling cornered. So what do they do? They lash out at us. We're lucky to have AOPA, NBAA, and EAA looking out for us, but given the low and declining number of pilots our defenses are already strained.
So what can we do? We could behave in turn and lash out at them and their salaries, or their own use of jets, or any of a number of things that float appealingly in range of our anger... or we can get the the heart of the matter. Here's a fact: it would be ludicrously expensive to start up a bureaucracy even remotely capable of inefficiently doing this sort of a job, meaning we would either be taking a giant step backward at a time when we literally are almost broke, or we the pilot community would be paying the government (against our will) to make us pay the government (against our will). Here's another fact: there are already taxes on Avgas, and many of us are willing to pay a few cents more at the pump to avoid hundreds of dollars of increased operating costs per year. It would not require the creation of new offices and middle management- it would be an adjustment of an existing system that could easily be reversed when the budget is in better shape.
Or, the point I'm trying to make in the first place, here's a third fact: getting a pilot's license and never flying once after your checkride is (making some reasonable assumptions) more expensive than maintaining your driver's license for the entirety of your life. There are MILLIONS of drivers out there. Want income? Up the driver's license fee by a dollar. Make it two dollars if you're really strapped. Or heck, make it five- it's going to wind up being pocket change for individuals and a bunch of revenue for the public. I know it won't be popular. Many drivers seem to think that roads fall out of the sky- a gift from God. But really? Five bucks is unacceptable, as much as we drive? Per mile it's miniscule. Yearly, I bet we find enough change lying on the ground to pay it happily. Or scrap the whole idea and tax cigarettes, alcohol, porn, etc. Or pot, the 1920s-era-booze of our generation. Hold a bake sale. Take us up on our offer to pay another 20 cents at the FBO. For cripes' sakes, do something, but don't kill American aviation.
If you're a pilot and you're reading this, start writing letters, and don't stop until mentioning the words User Fees is punishable by mandatory flight training in Europe. If you're not a pilot, do some research and then follow suite. We can't let Bad Ideas live in our policies. Save our skies.
-Your pilot friend