Let’s Copy Canada’s Air Traffic Control System

When air traffic control is held hostage by federal budget fights, American travelers lose.

The shutdown-induced mess at U.S. airports demonstrates yet another consequence of leaving our skies in the hands of a politically driven, budget-dependent, and inefficient government bureaucracy.   

The most recent bout of massive flight delays and cancellations is the result of the government shutdown, which has caused an indefinite delay in the paychecks of government-employed air traffic controllers—prompting many of them to decide not to show up to work.

But even before that, America’s antiquated air traffic control systems were costing Americans thousands of years of lost time due to flight delays and cancellations. Those ordinary delays and cancellations amount to billions of dollars in costs annually.

On top of that, inefficiencies limit the supply of flights, resulting in higher overall prices. Meanwhile, failing U.S. air traffic control infrastructure is causing communication outages, risking passenger safety.

It doesn’t have to be this way. Most other industrialized countries have lower-cost, more efficient air traffic control systems that are insulated from government spending battles. That’s because they are commercialized instead of bureaucratized.

Take Canada, for example. It commercialized its air traffic control system in 1996 and now has far more advanced capabilities with just two-thirds the cost of the U.S.

Similarly, Switzerland’s commercialized Skyguide air traffic control system boasts 95% on-time flights—as compared to only about 75% under the U.S. system.  

In an open letter to the Department of Government Efficiency, transportation expert Robert Poole described U.S. air traffic control as “a would-be high-tech service business trapped in a cautious bureaucracy.” He explained that the air traffic control and the Federal Aviation Administration’s reliance on annual funding means that “new systems get produced in small batches over a decade or more, with the last recipients not getting equipped before the system’s technology may already be obsolete.”

Government shutdown or not, it’s time for policymakers to free American passengers and businesses from bureaucratic inefficiencies and costs by commercializing America’s air traffic control.

Converting America’s air traffic control into a user-funded system has longstanding bipartisan support dating back to the Clinton administration. In 2018, the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee voted in favor of legislation that would have converted the Air Traffic Organization into a user-funded nonprofit corporation. President Donald Trump supported that legislation along with even further reforms. 

So long as the federal government insists on being in the business of air travel, delays, cancellations, cost, and safety will all remain in the hands of politicians and bureaucrats.