COMMENTARY | The Air Transport Association is projecting 2 percent fewer people will fly Thanksgiving week compared with 2010. It's being partly blamed on the invasive and time-consuming security procedures at the airport. The air travel industry and the federal government need to get their acts together because continuing to treat air travelers rudely, unprofessionally and government policies toward foreign travelers are costing this nation much-needed money.
According to U.S Travel Association President Roger Dow, it can cost a Brazilian family of four some $2,650 and take four months-plus just to get a visas to visit this country due to all the red tape and effort, incidents that have helped to reduce America's "long haul" travel market share to 12 percent (dramatically down from 17 percent) over the last decade.
Good, decent people give up wanting to spend money here, but where's the action at the federal level in applying more effectiveness and common sense to securing the nation from would-be terrorists like the "underwear bomber" while streamlining the process for entry by nonthreatening foreigners?
The "underwear bomber" managed to fall through the cracks and get on a flight to the U.S., while foreign families choose other countries to visit over America because of the costs and bureaucracy sometimes rooted in paranoia when addressing post-9/11 security issues.
As for the airlines, not a week goes by without hearing of yet another display of foolishness toward travelers. While people have yet to be charged for the stale air on a flight, some travelers going from India to the United Kingdom earlier this month had to pay for jet fuel en route to their destination.
Jet fuel prices already affect ticket prices, but one wonders when some U.S. carriers will try to pull the same above stunt on people desperate to get to their destinations, given that through Nov. 11, IATA reported jet fuel price increases have had a $61 billion global impact on the airlines. How many people are so fed up with air travel, they drive or just stay home?
Government bureaucrats, politicians, and the airline industry need to keep finding ways to make travel easier for sincere, law-abiding folks, rather than get bogged down so badly to where they're compared to the failed "supercommittee" on deficit reduction.
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