The Real Problem With the FAA

The Newark crisis comes soon after January’s deadly midair collision over Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, in which air-traffic control may have been a factor. The Trump administration has doubled down on Biden administration efforts to attract and retain controllers. To be sure, throwing money at the problem has some merit, given the dire condition of the ATC system. The resulting slow pace of FAA technology deployment means that new ATC systems might be obsolete by the time they are fully fielded. Despite broad agreement on the problem, efforts to take air-traffic control out of the FAA so that it can operate like a public utility have repeatedly failed.