No Country has such Dysfunctional Aviation Policies
Excerpts from eTurboNews
Years of federal underfunding caused the current air travel woes in the United States, as reported on eTurboNews earlier this week.
Paul Hudson, President, FlyersRights and a Member of the FAA Aviation Rulemaking Advisory Committee said wait a minute.
The press release by the US Travel Association published by eTurboNews omits many numbers or analysis to back up its assertion that the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has been underfunded for many years.
Here are the numbers: FAA’s overall budget in 2013 was $15 Billion, in 2020 it went to $20 billion, in 2024 to $25 billion.
Until the recent $1.7 Trillion infrastructure, this added about $5 B annually.
The FAA was nearly entirely funded by the ticket excise tax and fuel taxes paid into the Aviation Trust Fund. This revenue has stagnated or gone down for two big reasons.
The Airport and Airway Revenue Act of 1970 created the Trust Fund to provide a dedicated source of funding for the U.S. aviation system, independent of the General Fund. The authority to collect aviation excise taxes and to spend from the Aviation Trust Fund must be reauthorized periodically.
The Airport and Airway Trust Fund (AATF), sometimes referred to as the aviation trust fund, is the major funding source for federal aviation programs. The trust fund finances Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) capital investments in the airport and airway system as well as supports FAA research and operations costs.
Hudson explained: “The airlines have been avoiding the tax by shifting revenue from tickets to fees and other sources of revenue like money paid to airlines by credit card companies for frequent flyer miles.”
Due to COVID between 2020-22 there were big declines in the number of airline passengers and tickets sold, and less capital for the fund.
A deeper analysis is needed and one could go online to read the 900+ page annual budget requests by the FAA to do an even deeper analysis adding other sources.
Delays are the number one complaints by airline passengers.
