# New TSA fees to make airfare more expensive



## CHamilton (Jul 7, 2014)

New TSA fees to make airfare more expensive




> Starting on July 21, the Transportation Security Administration — you know, the folks who are in charge of confiscating your shampoo at the airport and taking you aside for an “additional screening” — will more than double the mandatory fee they charge many passengers and will no longer cap these fees. Under the old law, the fee, which is used for security, was $2.50 for each leg of a flight with a $5 cap on each one-way trip or a $10 cap on each round trip. But beginning July 21, the fee is $5.60 for each leg of a flight and that is not capped; if your layover is more than four hours on a domestic flight or 12 hours for international destinations, that counts as a second leg of the flight and you will be charged an additional fee.
> 
> While that may not sound like a lot, consider what this could mean for your wallet. If you book a domestic round trip and have two total connections (and the layover is four hours or more during each connection), you’ll end up shelling out nearly $25 to the TSA. That jacks up the average domestic airline ticket price by more than 5%.


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## Ryan (Jul 7, 2014)

I'd rather the TSA raise their own money, than take it out of the taxes I pay. Good for them.


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## Anderson (Jul 7, 2014)

Well, worth noting is that this also hits lower-priced carriers harder. You're looking at 3.73% on a $300 round-trip fare versus over 10% on the actual base fare of some cheap carriers (on People Express the TSA fee will now be looming in the 9-14% range).

Edit: For my thoughts, I'd rather the TSA didn't have carte blanche to determine what security we "need" and then pass along whatever the bill happens to be for that security.


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## Paulus (Jul 7, 2014)

> While that may not sound like a lot, consider what this could mean for your wallet. If you book a domestic round trip and have two total connections (and the layover is four hours or more during each connection), you’ll end up shelling out nearly $25 to the TSA.


That's well into "please just shoot me now" territory. Did a single five hour layover once on account of an excessively early arrival at first airport (you get what you get and you're grateful for it when it comes to rides in college). Never again, that was just boring as all get out. I suspect that the number of people who have such weirdly long layovers are incredibly limited.

That said, an extra $3.10 is probably not going to be noticed by anybody. Or maybe it will, who knows. I've never had anything but pleasurable experiences with TSA (even got to keep my shoes on for a flight last week), so maybe I'm just weird on this stuff.


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## Bob Dylan (Jul 7, 2014)

A tax by any other name is still a tax!!!! Homeland Security already has the largest federal budget except for Defense, why should the TSA need more money, what additional services will they provide????

Typical Politician up for reelection: " I didn't raise your taxes! Vote for me!"

Taxpayer/ Voter: " Then why are all my bills higher, some have more fees and taxes on them than the amount paid for the actual service charged for!" (,example. In Austin the City of Austin Bills have fees and taxes that are more than the basic charges for energy and water!)


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## Anderson (Jul 7, 2014)

Paulus said:


> > While that may not sound like a lot, consider what this could mean for your wallet. If you book a domestic round trip and have two total connections (and the layover is four hours or more during each connection), you’ll end up shelling out nearly $25 to the TSA.
> 
> 
> That's well into "please just shoot me now" territory. Did a single five hour layover once on account of an excessively early arrival at first airport (you get what you get and you're grateful for it when it comes to rides in college). Never again, that was just boring as all get out. I suspect that the number of people who have such weirdly long layovers are incredibly limited.
> ...


The flipside is that sometimes the connection is crap. It may not be as bad as some Amtrak markets where you can't make a same-day legal connection (or have to wait all day), but sometimes it's a choice between a touchy 30-minute connection and one that's a few hours out. Four hours plus is also long enough to, in more than a few cases, clear security and get out of an airport and head back in.

The biggest issue I see with this on some level is the ability of the TSA to raise the tax/fee/whatever it is being called unilaterally.


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## Ryan (Jul 7, 2014)

Anderson said:


> Edit: For my thoughts, I'd rather the TSA didn't have carte blanche to determine what security we "need" and then pass along whatever the bill happens to be for that security.





Anderson said:


> The biggest issue I see with this on some level is the ability of the TSA to raise the tax/fee/whatever it is being called unilaterally.


I do wholeheartedly agree with this.


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## Paulus (Jul 8, 2014)

Anderson said:


> Paulus said:
> 
> 
> > > While that may not sound like a lot, consider what this could mean for your wallet. If you book a domestic round trip and have two total connections (and the layover is four hours or more during each connection), you’ll end up shelling out nearly $25 to the TSA.
> ...


I get _a_ four hour layover, it's the two of them combined on a one way trip that has me scratching my head.


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## Anderson (Jul 8, 2014)

Paulus said:


> Anderson said:
> 
> 
> > Paulus said:
> ...


I think the writer was referring to two on a round trip. Two on a one-way would only get you $16.80; two on a round-trip would get you $22.40 (or "almost $25").


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## jis (Jul 8, 2014)

Is this TSA unilaterally without any change in law changing fees? Or is it something that was written into law carefully by Congresspeople? I believe this was part of the December budget deal. So no, TSA is not by itself raising its fees. It is not bestowed with the ability to do so. Congress asked them to raise their fees. As usual Congress is merely offloading some of the costs of TSA onto the users instead of everyone paying for it through the general tax revenues. This appears to be in line with the general direction of opting for targeted user fees instead of funding from general budget wherever possible. Whether that is good or bad is a separate discussion.

Ah found a reference in the much maligned Huff Post:



> Following orders from Congress, the Transportation Security Administration is poised to raise the fee to $5.60 each way. That's up from $2.50 each way for a nonstop flight and $5 for a trip including connections.
> 
> Trips with long stopovers will have bigger increases — each leg will trigger a new fee.
> 
> The proposed changes will be published Friday in the Federal Register and take effect 30 days later.


The full article can be seen here.


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## Ryan (Jul 8, 2014)

I don't believe that liberal rag. Can't you find a trustworthy source like Breitbart or Newsmax? h34r:


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## PRR 60 (Jul 8, 2014)

RyanS said:


> I don't believe that liberal rag. Can't you find a trustworthy source like Breitbart or Newsmax? h34r:


I personally get all my news from the New York Post. It may not be reliable, but it sure is entertaining.


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## jebr (Jul 8, 2014)

RyanS said:


> I don't believe that liberal rag. Can't you find a trustworthy source like Breitbart or Newsmax? h34r:


Here you go: http://www.foxbusiness.com/personal-finance/2014/06/19/say-hello-to-higher-airline-ticket-fees-next-month/



> Transportation Security Administration fees, which are added to ticket prices, are set to rise. In December’s budget negotiations, Congress agreed to raise the fees, which are estimated to raise $12.6 billion in the next 10 years.
> 
> 
> The agreement raised the fees to a flat rate of $5.60 added to each leg of a trip from $2.50 for a nonstop flight, or $5 for a trip with a layover.
> ...


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## Green Maned Lion (Jul 8, 2014)

Charging user fees is a retrogressive tax. Genral revenue is better, being a progressive tax. It's the wealthy that benefit most from government largess. They should pay for it, too.


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## Anderson (Jul 8, 2014)

You know, I'd forgotten about that deal. Blame all of the political garbage down here where I live.


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## Anderson (Jul 8, 2014)

Green Maned Lion said:


> Charging user fees is a retrogressive tax. Genral revenue is better, being a progressive tax. It's the wealthy that benefit most from government largess. They should pay for it, too.


Not entirely. If the fee were a percentage of the fare (or even of the "fare plus airline-assessed fees") it would be progressive, since on a lot of airlines, for every dollar you'd hit a "normal" passenger in coach you'd hit someone up in First Class several times over. Effectively taxing baggage fees and the like would also be worth considering since airlines are turning to them in no small part because they _aren't_ subject to those taxes

Edit: In a sense, fees are only really regressive when(A) they're flat (i.e. $X per flight/segment) and (B) they apply to something being broadly used (i.e. a fee only being assessed on first class passengers isn't exactly regressive).


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