The high costs and inefficiency of the TSA make sense if we think of the TSA (or the head of the TSA) as a budget-maximizing agency. The TSA has little incentive to maximize "output" or actually "solve" the problems it is supposed to handle (its existence depends on the existence of these problems). Instead, it seeks to use up as much of its budget as possible. And since only the agency (and not Congress) knows its true cost curve, it has no incentive to be efficient in its use of funds. Nuskanen and other traditional theorists would say that agency autonomy (lack of oversight, etc) makes this bureaucratic inefficiency a fact. Weingast and Moran, on the other hand, would say that the relevant Congressional committees possess a system of rewards and sanctions that is sufficient to effectively align the incentives of the agency with the incentives of Congress.
It appears from this article that the relevant congressmen (which would include Mica, as the House Transportation Committee chairman) either do not possess an effective system of rewards and sanctions, or have not yet put this system into place. The congressmen might want to make greater use of its power of appropriations, and threaten to make cuts to the TSA's budget if the TSA does not 'get in line.'
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Caroline makes good points in her post about big-time bureaucracy. I'd like to add that bureaucracy is not only incredibly inefficient in the big leagues but also in the small ones.
Anyone who wants to serve on a rescue squad in Virginia is familiar with the Office of Emergency Medical Services (OEMS). There is no monitoring of OEMS because of the lack of information. People figure that they wouldn't understand the medical aspects of "EMT-ing" although most times, EMTs serve as glorified taxi cabs to people too lazy or unable to drive to the hospital. Almost everyone has to take those stupid qualifying tests two or three times. For those of us here that meant driving to Richmond and paying the fee.
Because they are the monopoly provider, there is no reason to be efficient. For instance, I was helping a paramedic (which requires 2+ years of training) learn which basic skills he was allowed to do. He had turned in his license renewal papers a day late after returning from military service and then OEMS decides to make him take tests below his skill level to resume his job. Like an airline, they take money from an applicant (who is usually going to work on a volunteer basis) when they are missing one (meaningless) code. I had to retake my test because an overweight tester got really excited seeing me with the GAY, male volunteer and started going "touch him everywhere, touch him EVERYWHERE". I guess she was protected by the insulation afforded to her by the bureaucracy because I saw her at my retest. While I can't monetarily quantify the consequences of me not being an EMT for the Charlottesville community, I can say it resulted in stupid expenditures for the retest. I can say that the other EMT lost his salary and the community paid a steep price by not having his expertise on the job.
I think that the TSA and OEMS of Virginia could both benefit from a little less insulation.
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