5 ms·

"I pay money to cut people in line, but someone else paid more money to cut me in line!"

by blix 4y ago

troydavis 4y ago
TSA Pre-Check charges $78/5 years to recover the cost of the screening process, which they've documented incredibly well: https://www.tsa.gov/sites/default/files/fee-development-report.pdf https://www.tsa.gov/sites/default/files/fee-development-repo...
- blix 4y ago
  TSA Pre-Check's artifically low, non-market price for line cutting is the reason Clear isn't selling for $100+ per flight, with several layers of price discrimination.
  - bourbonjuggler 4y ago
    I don't think Clear would have the same number of customers if they charged that much. Everyone would continue to stand in line and complain about how bad the TSA is at its job.
    - blix 4y ago
      If it were an option selected when purchasing a ticket, I suspect it would be on the order of first/business class in terms of popularity. Maybe the price point needs some work, but certainly ~a lot~ more than $15/yr for the first tier of priority). Clear and Pre-Check both have signficant friction to sign-up. If line cutting was offered with little friction (i.e. without security considerations), I think it would be quite popular.
  - Jiro 4y ago
    In a free market, there wouldn't be a need to sell line cutting in the first place because it would be legal to run an airline that you can fly on without dealing with the TSA at all. Forcing everyone to go through the TSA is inherently non-market, so there can't be a market price for it.
chipsa 4y ago
Pre check has generally been a separate line at most airports I've been at. It also allows a changed security posture: don't have to take off shoes, belt, use the nudie scanner. Clear literally just lets you cut in line.
- blix 4y ago
  I don't think Pre-Check would be as popular if you had to wait in the same line as everybody else, even if you got to keep your shoes on. Literal line cutting is just a special case of separate lines with different processing priority.
  - scarby2 4y ago
    most of the time it takes significantly more time to faff around taking off shoes/belts, taking laptops/liquids out of bags than it does to get through the ID check section. Though as more advanced scanners come in this might lose value, at many airports now everything stays in your bag anyway, shoes stay on and you go through the whole body scan (which takes 5 seconds). It was amazing how quick it was going through las vegas
  - devilbunny 4y ago
    Pre-TSA, when airports ran their own security checkpoints, it was not unusual to have a separate line for first class and high-level frequent flyer members. So that aspect of it has always been around. We just made it a governmentally-enforced one. Plus, a lot of Precheck people have it via Global Entry, which really is paying to skip the line. Since I got GE, I have never once spent as much time at immigration coming back to the US as it took me to walk from the gate to the immigration hall. Longest line ever was maybe five minutes, because an entire jumbo jet's flight crew was in front of me. I've bypassed hours-long lines.
    - snotrockets 4y ago
      Some airports still have separate lines (including to customs and immigration) for some frequent flyer status holders. Some are plainly visible, like in IST, some are better hidden with a separate entry into the airport itself.

"I pay money to cut people in line, but someone else paid more money to cut me in line!"

by blix 4y ago

"I pay money to cut people in line, but someone else paid more money to cut me in line!"

TSA Pre-Check charges $78/5 years to recover the cost of the screening process, which they've documented incredibly well: https://www.tsa.gov/sites/default/files/fee-development-report.pdf https://www.tsa.gov/sites/default/files/fee-development-repo...

blix 4y ago
TSA Pre-Check's artifically low, non-market price for line cutting is the reason Clear isn't selling for $100+ per flight, with several layers of price discrimination.
- bourbonjuggler 4y ago
  I don't think Clear would have the same number of customers if they charged that much. Everyone would continue to stand in line and complain about how bad the TSA is at its job.
  - blix 4y ago
    If it were an option selected when purchasing a ticket, I suspect it would be on the order of first/business class in terms of popularity. Maybe the price point needs some work, but certainly ~a lot~ more than $15/yr for the first tier of priority). Clear and Pre-Check both have signficant friction to sign-up. If line cutting was offered with little friction (i.e. without security considerations), I think it would be quite popular.
- Jiro 4y ago
  In a free market, there wouldn't be a need to sell line cutting in the first place because it would be legal to run an airline that you can fly on without dealing with the TSA at all. Forcing everyone to go through the TSA is inherently non-market, so there can't be a market price for it.

chipsa 4y ago

Pre check has generally been a separate line at most airports I've been at. It also allows a changed security posture: don't have to take off shoes, belt, use the nudie scanner. Clear literally just lets you cut in line.

blix 4y ago
I don't think Pre-Check would be as popular if you had to wait in the same line as everybody else, even if you got to keep your shoes on. Literal line cutting is just a special case of separate lines with different processing priority.
- scarby2 4y ago
  most of the time it takes significantly more time to faff around taking off shoes/belts, taking laptops/liquids out of bags than it does to get through the ID check section. Though as more advanced scanners come in this might lose value, at many airports now everything stays in your bag anyway, shoes stay on and you go through the whole body scan (which takes 5 seconds). It was amazing how quick it was going through las vegas
- devilbunny 4y ago
  Pre-TSA, when airports ran their own security checkpoints, it was not unusual to have a separate line for first class and high-level frequent flyer members. So that aspect of it has always been around. We just made it a governmentally-enforced one. Plus, a lot of Precheck people have it via Global Entry, which really is paying to skip the line. Since I got GE, I have never once spent as much time at immigration coming back to the US as it took me to walk from the gate to the immigration hall. Longest line ever was maybe five minutes, because an entire jumbo jet's flight crew was in front of me. I've bypassed hours-long lines.
  - snotrockets 4y ago
    Some airports still have separate lines (including to customs and immigration) for some frequent flyer status holders. Some are plainly visible, like in IST, some are better hidden with a separate entry into the airport itself.