Federal Air Marshals - Useless

[sba55]

I love this story. How useful do you think Federal Air Marshals are? Think they make one arrest a year per person? Maybe 10 arrests?

No. They make 1/1000 arrest per year per person. Or, in other words. we're spending $200 Million per arrest. More air marshals have been arrested than the number of people that they have arrested. That's funny; I can't think of a better word.

-Felix

 

[RotorAndWing]

And many Law Enforcement Officers will go through an entire career and never draw a weapon in the line of duty, but that doesn't make them useless.

Everyone on the front line of defense has to be 100% right all the time. The terrorist only have to get it right once.

 

[Greg Bockelman]

I love this story. How useful do you think Federal Air Marshals are? Think they make one arrest a year per person? Maybe 10 arrests?

No. They make 1/1000 arrest per year per person. Or, in other words. we're spending $200 Million per arrest. More air marshals have been arrested than the number of people that they have arrested. That's funny; I can't think of a better word.

-Felix

Thing of it is, Felix, what value do you put on the deterrent value of the Air Marshals? How many incidents DIDN'T happen because an Air Marshal may have been onboard a plane?

 

[EdFred]

Thing of it is, Felix, what value do you put on the deterrent value of the Air Marshals? How many incidents DIDN'T happen because an Air Marshal may have been onboard a plane?

four

 

[flyersfan31]

A more appropriate number, and one that is exceedingly difficult to calculate, is the cost per deterred attack. Is it worth $1000000 per deterred attack? $10,000,000? $1.00?

 

[Pi1otguy]

A more appropriate number, and one that is exceedingly difficult to calculate, is the cost per deterred attack. Is it worth $1000000 per deterred attack? $10,000,000? $1.00?

About $100,000,000 per deterred attack?

That's a $50,000,000 plane + ~80 pax at $5,000,000 each ($10M depreciated 50% assuming avg pax near 50% of service life) + $10,000,000 in incidentals (cleanup, investigations, etc).

 

[Witmo]

I've got no problem with Federal Air Marshals on planes just like I got no problem with cops patrolling city streets. I can see some utility in having them. TFRs however, serve no useful purpose that I can see. Presidential TFRs that pop up and disrupt legitimate commercial aviation are the worst.

 

[RotorAndWing]

About $100,000,000 per deterred attack?

That's a $50,000,000 plane + ~80 pax at $5,000,000 each ($10M depreciated 50% assuming avg pax near 50% of service life) + $10,000,000 in incidentals (cleanup, investigations, etc).

Plus the millions of dollars lost by an entire airline industry and the following effects to our economy.

No thanks.

 

[Pi1otguy]

Plus the millions of dollars lost by an entire airline industry and the following effects to our economy.

No thanks.

Without going to spin zone, you might as well add the cost of our response to the perpetrators.

Considering the expense we've gone through over 4 successful attacks 2001 and a few failed attempts since I'd say 1 deterred/thwarted attack a decade more then covers the program's cost.

 

[sba55]

Thing of it is, Felix, what value do you put on the deterrent value of the Air Marshals? How many incidents DIDN'T happen because an Air Marshal may have been onboard a plane?

I don't put any value on things that are inherently impossible to calculate. You might just as well ask if spending 1 trillion dollars to build a new bridge is worth it because there is a chance that it saved the human population from extinction. Absurd, I know, but there can't be and there isn't any evidence that either action did or didn't cause the specified consequence.

So, in order to construct a good argument (ie., one that can be proven/disproved), I don't talk about the value of what-ifs. The fact is that the program, given the facts that we know, is not a wise use of money. There are other programs that demonstrably are a good use of money. Good use of money means a good return on investment. It doesn't mean "a good return on investment given some hypotheticals that cannot possibly be proven".

-Felix

 

[sba55]

Without going to spin zone, you might as well add the cost of our response to the perpetrators.

Considering the expense we've gone through over 4 successful attacks 2001 and a few failed attempts since I'd say 1 deterred/thwarted attack a decade more then covers the program's cost.

It sure does. Unfortunately, you cannot provide any evidence to show that this program had anything to do with a thwarted attack. In the same way that nobody in the world can show any evidence that an apple I just ate didn't prevent any attacks. Given this line of reasoning, I suggest we eat more apples

 

[Richard]

This reminds me of the "Ricketts not rockets" protests* during the Apollo program. Such an unsubstantiated personal bias strongly suggested that money spent had to be either/or. Further, the implication was the monies would actually yield the intended result of a cure. Compare that to the spin off technologies of the NASA programs when trying to determine the value of betterment to society whether to the whole or a sub-group.


*The protests argued that money spent on putting a man on the moon would be more effectively spent on medical research for curing Ricketts.

 

[RyanShort1]

Easy solution is to allow other licensed weapon holders to participate in a voluntary program... Assuming you continue to deny folks Constitutional rights.

Ryan

 

[jesse]

Easy solution is to allow other licensed weapon holders to participate in a voluntary program... Assuming you continue to deny folks Constitutional rights.

Ryan

As a conceal and carry permit holder that regularly carries I'm not sure how many average folks I'd want packing heat on an airliner...

 

[ron22]

As a conceal and carry permit holder that regularly carries I'm not sure how many average folks I'd want packing heat on an airliner...

Jesse you do not trust me with a loaded gun?
I do agree with you not sure just how many of the conceal and carry people I would trust.