Pre 911 airport security was privately run and in the wake of the attacks it was taken over by the Federal government. I believe that although new security mea

Pre 911 airport security was privately run and in the wake of the attacks it was taken over by the Federal government. I believe that although new security measures were felt to be necessary in light of the awareness of how much damage a hijacked plane can cause, the change to management by a federal agency with no real incentive to make things move quickly, or to even demonstrate that precautions are reasonable, wasn’t as successful as we might have hoped. It is odd, for example, how they screen pilots ... who are obviously already in a position to do the thing we are most avidly trying to prevent ... this causes many people to feel this is all “security theater” that may create a deterrent effect through psychology but may not be doing much to prevent future attacks. Also the TSA employees don’t seem to fear for their jobs much ... which would be consistent with many other government employees ... so they are occasionally quite rude, although many are friendly and professional. Obviously the airlines are perfectly positioned to have motivation both to speed boarding and reduce risk of damage to people and equipment. It’s plausible that if they were in charge of security, and had to answer to insurance e companies who also assess risk, we would end up with a far better implementation.