How We Pay $3,700 Per Passenger to Subsidize Airline Tickets
Every day in 22 cities around the country, commuter planes take off with so few passengers that the pilots and crew outnumber the passengers. Each passenger pays a fare that’s less than $100. However, the federal government subsidizes the rest of the cost and pays airlines as much as $3,700 for each person on board.
The controversial subsidy program is called Essential Air Services. It was enacted by Congress in 1978 as a “temporary” measure to help rural communities that were facing the loss of air travel when small airports were to be closed due to airline deregulation.
Instead, Congress has temporarily extended the program 21 times over the last 33 years. The 22nd extension, lasting to January, was passed last week by the Senate.
Most importantly, the EAS program has mushroomed into a airline routing program based on political favors. And the subsidy doesn’t go to the traveling public; it goes to the air carriers. The $3,700 per passenger subsidy, for example, has been championed by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV), who fought and won the earmark for keeping open air service for Ely, Nevada (population: 4,000).
How inefficient is the EAS program? While the Feds pay out $3,700 per passenger to airlines to fly from Ely to Las Vegas, Southwest Airlines sells tickets for Las Vegas to Chicago nonstop for as little as $153 one-way — about 10 cents per mile.
Airline columnist Joe Brancatelli, writing in the business journal Portfolio.com, says the EAS program is
fast becoming the metaphoric poster boy for wasteful government spending, entrenched interests, political gridlock.
House Republicans have vowed to kill the program, but its supporters, largely Democrats and the Obama administration, are keeping the program alive. The administration pushed and won another short-term extension through January 2012.
In the latest temporary approval, federal subsidies will now be limited to $1,000 per passenger and the program will be offered to those airports that are at least 90 miles from a large or medium airport hub.
Rep. John Mica (R-FL), the chairman of the House Transportation Committee accepted the latest extension but is still leading the fight to curtail large parts of the program. On September 13, he said,
While this legislation signifies a bipartisan, bicameral agreement to move forward, it must not be just a temporary band-aid.
The reforms are considered small given the extraordinary growth of the program. Over the last ten years, EAS subsidies have grown by 300% while most planes still take off and land with few passengers. In 2001, the temporary program cost $50 million to operate. Now it has ballooned to $200 million.
I’d like to comment,”unbelievable” but the problem is that this is all too believable. Combine it with http://pajamasmedia.com/tatler/2011/09/21/austerity-holders-doj-paid-16-for-muffins-5-per-swedish-meatball/
and those outside the Washington area will have a perfect picture of what the federal government is doing day in and day out, while American citizens are sending in their tax payments.
Where’s the outrage — other in the Tea Party and on PJM? Is the country sleeping through this insidious & invidious behavior? It sure looks that way.
No one has exposed the problem, and the Marxist Media will never pick it up because it just isn’t juicy enough. The Marxist Media members aren’t even aware of it, because it hasn’t been mentioned in the Democrat Party talking points memos they receive daily.
These are the same guys who disingenuously complain about “subsidies” to the oil industry that really aren’t.
the Embraer is a 120 not 102.
lot of the 120 prop parts are used on the 135K/L/ER series.
they don’t fare that well often.
Minor nit: The Beech is the 1900, not the 190.
Obviously the solution to this is to run high speed rail to all these small towns, why didn’t you think of that?
Gloria, I used to work in a small organization comprised of about half government employees and about half contract employees, when we hosted a conference, we had to pass the hat to come up with money for coffee and
had one of our people bake some cookies, I guess Edwards is right, there really are two Americas.
I’ve been away for a while. My significant other and I traveled to the mystical land of Tibet, where I found a spirituality that I never thought existed. I’ve never been a believer in organized religion, but the Tibetans has a mystical quality that really touches – dare I say it? – the sole. Now, the reason I bring it up here is because I know there are teeming millions who really can’t afford to fly to far-away exotic places, like Tibet and Martha’s Vineyard. So I can see the need to subsidize the airlines so that poor people from, say, Kansas City, can experience the life changing spirituality of mystical places. Imagine what it would do to some poor young girl, trapped in a place like Alabama, surrounded by crazy evangelicals, to escape, if only for a month, to Tibet, where she can find herself and come to love the herself, as I did. Imagine? Can you imagine that? That’s how to look at this airline ticket subsidy thing. If people weren’t so selfish with their money they’d see things that are right before their eyes. Wonderment.
Welcome back.
Since at least the 1930s every tiny town in America has had bus service. If you want to get out of some small place you can take a bus. If you Google “bus service to” and put in the name of most hamlets with populations of 300 people or fewer you’ll find a Greyhound or Peter Pan or regional bus that will get you outa there, if that’s what you want to do. I take buses a lot. They’re cleaner and cheaper than Amtrak (also heavily subsidized as are trains in most countries but subsidized so that the service is far better than Amtrak.
My point is simply this: anyone who works hard and saves can get out of anywhere on a bus. The bus can take a person to the largest big city with an airport, or can take a passenger to a big city to change buses and go to another big city by bus.
No one who works hard must stay anywhere in this country; on the other hand, nor do they require a plane (subsidized or not) to go anywhere else.
“Heavily subsidized” needs some quantification.
Probably the most meaningful way of looking at transit subsidies is as percent of operating costs from fares. In that regard, Amtrak does pretty well at 87%. Our local public transit agency here in Silicon Valley is 10% which is low but not atypical.
The EAS program sounds really low at a fraction of one percent but one can’t tell from the article.
At least those corporate business jet owners are not flying EAS.
It is in no way the federal government’s job to see that people are allowed or even able, to visit a place to get a chance to achieve “enlightenment” or to “find themselves”. And to add insult to injury, the implication that someone might be “trapped” in Alabama is ludicrous. Buy a ticket on the Greyhound bus and say “Bye Bye” if you feel “trapped”. And you have also insulted the people of Alabama with your unthinking comment that someone would need to “escape” from that state and you insult a group of religious people at the same time. How would you feel if someone referred to your “Tibetans” as lazy worthless people who want to sit around all day saying “om” and staring at their naval while they become “enlightened”?
Feel free to subsidize someone else’s travel with your own money, not mine. People who think as you do are why we have a $15 trillion national debt.
One is forced to wonder why the Republicans can’t communicate the basic line that HARRY REID is a hostage taker. He’s willing to hold up hundreds of millions of dollars in FAA funds so that the 4000 people of Ely, NV can benefit from a subsidy paid for by the rest of America’s taxpayers.
Because maybe they are as ignorant and inept as those totally reliant on the MSM?
Because Republicans have these in their states as well and don’t want to give them up. Most Republicans are just as bad as the Democrats.
Not just Dems, but Republicans, too. Specter and Pitts. They are both formerly-known-as-elected. We need many more formerly-known-as-elected officials.
It is inaccurate to say “U S Air Express, United Express, Delta Connection” etc.
Different Companies are given contracts to fly as these commuter airlines.
Generally, the parent company issues “Flight Departure” Contracts. Fly the plane, get a fee and the ticket sales all go to that parent company.
Some companies have better reputations than others and some are better to work for than others. However, I know of none that routinely allow maintenance problems. Having worked the ramp for a decade and a half I became well aware of what problems did exist. These were invariably corrected in short order.
Aircraft that I loaded and serviced were the EM2 J31, CRJ and CR7. The first two along with the aforementioned BE19 (and others) are turboprops and extremely easy on the fuel while having the same engine reliability as the pure jets.
So kindly refrain from co-mingling tax-funded subsidies with honest business deals.
BTW: Whom do I consider the best of these commuters? Skywest of St George Utah. Long-time Delta Connection carrier and United Express since 1998 and not Continental Connection by virtue of arrangements between Continental and United.
I coordinated Reason’s partnership with the American Bus Association, Natural Resources Defense Council and Taxpayers for Common Sense on a study showing how much taxpayers could save if the subsidized Essential Air Service program for rural airports was replaced with bus service. Bloomberg writes, “Taxpayers would save up to $89 million a year if buses rather than planes served 38 cities where the U.S. subsidizes flights, the American Bus Association said in a study…’Transportation policy needs to focus on moving people and goods efficiently, and not necessarily being sexy,’ said Shirley Ybarra, senior transportation policy analyst with the Reason Foundation.”
You can find the full report and its materials here:
http://reason.org/news/show/essential-air-service-compare-bus-s