CBO ATC Privatization Numbers Misleading

denverpilot said:
Thought it was an interesting analysis.

Not arguing privatized or not, either way. Just noting how broken the normally useful CBO's numbers were that folks are quoting as saying the House bill causes "massive debt". It doesn't.

http://dailysignal.com/2017/08/17/another-bogus-score-air-traffic-control-reform/
Click to expand...

Maybe, maybe not. Yes, they'll wind down taxes but they'll institute 'use fees' so ultimately the airlines will still pass expense on and the rest of us get dinged twice.
 
I quit paying attention to and believing what the CBO has to say about anything. they haven't been right in a long time.
 
labbadabba said:
Maybe, maybe not. Yes, they'll wind down taxes but they'll institute 'use fees' so ultimately the airlines will still pass expense on and the rest of us get dinged twice.
Click to expand...

Perhaps. But it's unlikely they could support a debt load like all the "aviation news" outlets ran immediately without understanding the numbers. Including that all mighty organization that claims to be inside the beltway fighting for us. Maybe they are, or maybe they just mailed it in without any analysis.

rk911 said:
I quit paying attention to and believing what the CBO has to say about anything. they haven't been right in a long time.
Click to expand...

They do get some things right. Just not this.
 
denverpilot said:
Thought it was an interesting analysis.

Not arguing privatized or not, either way. Just noting how broken the normally useful CBO's numbers were that folks are quoting as saying the House bill causes "massive debt". It doesn't.

http://dailysignal.com/2017/08/17/another-bogus-score-air-traffic-control-reform/
Click to expand...

Then the House should have fixed the bill before submitting it.
Its not like they do not know the rules. And if the CBO did interpretation, as the author of the article suggests, then they would be crucified on all other bills.

Tim
 
tspear said:
Then the House should have fixed the bill before submitting it.
Its not like they do not know the rules. And if the CBO did interpretation, as the author of the article suggests, then they would be crucified on all other bills.

Tim
Click to expand...

Perhaps that's why they didn't? I know not the silliness of D.C. I just watch with amusement.

But a repetitive theme is that they're either incredibly stupid or incredibly manipulative and not much possible in between. Stuff like your question.
 
denverpilot said:
Perhaps that's why they didn't? I know not the silliness of D.C. I just watch with amusement.

But a repetitive theme is that they're either incredibly stupid or incredibly manipulative and not much possible in between. Stuff like your question.
Click to expand...
No, the House and the Administration thought they could push through and ignore the CBO and make the airline lobby happy.
Same stuff happened on healthcare, energy, coal regulations...

Tim

Sent from my LG-H631 using Tapatalk
 
CBO is a joke. We all know privatization would save the government boat loads of money. Whether or not it's the right path to take is a different question. But the idea that privatization would be more expensive is ridiculous to me.
 
Harold Rutila said:
CBO is a joke. We all know privatization would save the government boat loads of money. Whether or not it's the right path to take is a different question. But the idea that privatization would be more expensive is ridiculous to me.
Click to expand...

How will it save money?
A private company has a profit motive, the profit has to come from somewhere.
There is no incentive for a private company to lower costs. A government agency at least has the theory of voter/political oversight to constrain costs.

Tim
 
tspear said:
No, the House and the Administration thought they could push through and ignore the CBO and make the airline lobby happy.
Same stuff happened on healthcare, energy, coal regulations...

Tim

Sent from my LG-H631 using Tapatalk
Click to expand...

Either brilliant (wanted them killed) or incredibly stupid. Only two choices. :)

There's definitely bills where one can see the politicians pandering to their base that are written in such a way as their "opponents" can flamethrower the thing the second it's published.

They don't talk about this form of "bi-partisanship" too much. LOL.

tspear said:
How will it save money?
A private company has a profit motive, the profit has to come from somewhere.
There is no incentive for a private company to lower costs. A government agency at least has the theory of voter/political oversight to constrain costs.

Tim
Click to expand...

A theory at best with an unlimited debt ceiling. (No, they'll never EVER vote to not raise it.)

Which makes the outrage over the CBO report even funnier. "It'll create massive debt! Leave it in the hands of the debt-making professionals!"

Hehehe. Awesomesauce.
 
Harold Rutila said:
CBO is a joke. We all know privatization would save the government boat loads of money. Whether or not it's the right path to take is a different question. But the idea that privatization would be more expensive is ridiculous to me.
Click to expand...
Harold, please don't tell me what I "know."
 
AOPA this week spent half the show complaining about the government (i.e. TFR's not accurate on government websites), and the other half of the show arguing against privatization. o_O
 
Cluemeister said:
AOPA this week spent half the show complaining about the government (i.e. TFR's not accurate on government websites), and the other half of the show arguing against privatization. o_O
Click to expand...

Uhhhhhh

That's what you pay them to do, that's what I want them to do, you didn't give them money just for a stupid hat and a sticker did you, these are the issues affecting aviation.
 
Cluemeister said:
AOPA this week spent half the show complaining about the government (i.e. TFR's not accurate on government websites), and the other half of the show arguing against privatization. o_O
Click to expand...

Kinda like they argued for modernization, then argued not to decommission NDBs..
 
CBO??? Just another politicized arm of the government IMO

As for cost, Big Government is the king of waste, sure privatization will be looking for a profit, but they will also look to stop wasteful spending.

Real world.... we will have to wait and see if it is better/worse, more/less efficient, more/less costly.

Time will tell
 
Zhunter said:
CBO??? Just another politicized arm of the government IMO

As for cost, Big Government is the king of waste, sure privatization will be looking for a profit, but they will also look to stop wasteful spending.

Real world.... we will have to wait and see if it is better/worse, more/less efficient, more/less costly.

Time will tell
Click to expand...

Why will a private company do so?
What makes it inherently more efficient?
Once you answer this, document how this applies to a captured and monopoly market, such as ATC.

Tim
 
tspear said:
Why will a private company do so?
What makes it inherently more efficient?
Once you answer this, document how this applies to a captured and monopoly market, such as ATC.

Tim
Click to expand...

Yeah, OK, right after you list all of the efficient government programs! Geez! A private company is motivated by profit to streamline waste. Government by nature thrives on wasteful spending to line the pockets of politicians, lobbyists, and constituents.

Any ATC will be a monopoly whether public or private unless I am missing something! Let's see, "I am going to use companyX ATC to transverse Chicago today, no wait, I think I will use companyZ ATC to transverse Chicago instead as they were better than company x last time I overflow Chicago" is a conversation/thought process that will never happen. WTF dude? ATC has to be a monopoly otherwise there would be mid-air collisions every F'ing day!
 
Zhunter said:
Yeah, OK, right after you list all of the efficient government programs! Geez! A private company is motivated by profit to streamline waste. Government by nature thrives on wasteful spending to line the pockets of politicians, lobbyists, and constituents.

Any ATC will be a monopoly whether public or private unless I am missing something! Let's see, "I am going to use companyX ATC to transverse Chicago today, no wait, I think I will use companyZ ATC to transverse Chicago instead as they were better than company x last time I overflow Chicago" is a conversation/thought process that will never happen. WTF dude? ATC has to be a monopoly otherwise there would be mid-air collisions every F'ing day!
Click to expand...

There are plenty of efficient government services. They just make glaciers look fast (e.g. DMV/MVS/RMV). But trying to change the subject, does not alleviate the question, why are private companies generally considered more efficient?

Since you will not answer, I will.
Why is a private company motivated to streamline waste? What makes them do so? Profit? Not that I have ever seen.
Cutting costs is almost always a result of competition in any inelastic service. Sure it happens, but that is not the general case you will find. Consider airline prices. Until a low cost airline offers service to a major airport, the legacy carriers had high prices. The commodity, airline tickets were rather inelastic. If you need to fly, you need to fly. Competition is what caused the carriers to lower prices.
This can also be seen by looking at retail gas prices. The more gas stations you have (until saturation occurs), the lower the price. One lone station on the corner in town, prices are higher....
So, in a monopoly situation, such as the ATC example you have provided, how do you get competition for an inelastic service?
What is the market force, where is it being applied, how does it work?

Tim
 
There is NO market in an ATC situation due to safety as I pointed out above. There will be no concurrent competition as you use in your example. The only safeguard would be price fixing from a downward position from regulations. Likely to happen, doubtful. My point was the cost to operate the ATC will go down. But will the usage fees go down? Ha, doubtful.
 
The proposal in the bill is the creation of a not-for-profit corporation (similar to Nav Canada) so straightforward profit motive won't apply. ATC would simply cease to be (operationally) a responsibility of the FAA.
 
Zhunter said:
There is NO market in an ATC situation due to safety as I pointed out above. There will be no concurrent competition as you use in your example. The only safeguard would be price fixing from a downward position from regulations. Likely to happen, doubtful. My point was the cost to operate the ATC will go down. But will the usage fees go down? Ha, doubtful.
Click to expand...

Why will the costs go down. You keep repeating this, but never provide a basis for this assumption.
Further, if the price does not go down, but costs do, where does the profit go?

tiger said:
The proposal in the bill is the creation of a not-for-profit corporation (similar to Nav Canada) so straightforward profit motive won't apply. ATC would simply cease to be (operationally) a responsibility of the FAA.
Click to expand...

Read the proposal further. The proposal effectively gives control of ATC to the airlines.

Tim
 
Cluemeister said:
AOPA this week spent half the show complaining about the government (i.e. TFR's not accurate on government websites), and the other half of the show arguing against privatization. o_O
Click to expand...

Clip4 said:
Kinda like they argued for modernization, then argued not to decommission NDBs..
Click to expand...

And argued for ADS-B.

tspear said:
Why is a private company motivated to streamline waste? What makes them do so? Profit? Not that I have ever seen.
Click to expand...

It works a lot better if the company is truly private and not a stock-market public company.

Owners of truly private business tend toward actually looking for ways to make their companies be a whole lot more efficient than public companies who need to appease the "quarterlies" in their stocks.

Public companies get a LOT more sloppy about things, in my experience. Especially big ones.
 
denverpilot said:
And argued for ADS-B.



It works a lot better if the company is truly private and not a stock-market public company.

Owners of truly private business tend toward actually looking for ways to make their companies be a whole lot more efficient than public companies who need to appease the "quarterlies" in their stocks.

Public companies get a LOT more sloppy about things, in my experience. Especially big ones.
Click to expand...

Having worked for small (2-3 person companies and pretty large (20,000+ employees)), lived through the transition from private to public at a 20,000+ company and grown the company I work for now from the 2 of us who founded it to the 220 or so today, I'm not sure that's so much a public private thing as it is a large bureaucracy thing. When you have tens of thousands (or more) employees there are things you have to do via policies and rules and middle management that you handled when you were small. Policies, rules and middle management tend to be wrong in some cases, but those cases generally don't make it to your desk to fix when you've got tens of thousands of employees. If you have good middle managers who are empowered to fix things, maybe.

And yes, there is certainly the pressure to make money this quarter that can cause short term thinking. But any really big organization will have some waste and inefficiency because it's lost in the noise.

John
 
jsstevens said:
But any really big organization will have some waste and inefficiency because it's lost in the noise.
John
Click to expand...
Not so much lost in the noise, but a fundamental management decision. Having co-founded and grown a consulting company from myself and a partner to over a hundred consultants there is a fundamental change in perspective that is often missed.
A small company under roughly ten to twenty employees (varies by field) you are focused on the tactical day to day and trying to get the absolute maximum out of each employee.
As you grow, the focus becomes less about getting the best out of each employee and more about about getting the best average performance across the company.
Further, many things which a lot of managers consider a pain exist for the very specific reason to ensure there is a perception of equality across the organization as much as practical. A great example is job descriptions. Often small companies do not bother, but by the time you start to add a layer of management between the end employee and the executive making the decisions, you should start to consider these tools. The purpose of a job description is not make middle management's life a pain, or to cause inefficiencies, but to instead help prevent problems from growing to the point an executive needs to focus any attention on the issue. In the IT space, testers and developers are not paid the same, even though depending on the specific kind of testing the skill set may be the same. A job description helps eliminate a lot of the potential problems between these two groups.

Tim
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top