Terrorism is a High-Rent Worry
The last chapter of my book, What Makes a Terrorist, considers the economic, psychological and political consequences of terrorism. The chapter concludes that the economic impact of terrorism – at least insofar as terrorism with conventional weapons is concerned – is likely to be small if people and policymakers do not over react. I reach this conclusion by noting that even horrific attacks like those on 9/11 destroy a relatively small share of the nation’s stock of physical and human capital.
I’ve noticed something interesting from talking about this subject at bookstores, alumni meetings, think tanks and other venues. Wealthy people are more likely to argue that terrorism is a major threat to the economy and our way of life. Even pointing out that major earthquakes usually have a small effect on the economy in the long run does not persuade them.
It dawned on me that terrorism is a high-rent problem – in two respects. First, the threat of terrorism has risen to a top concern only because another, undoubtedly more severe threat, was eliminated. Of course, I’m referring to the demise of the Soviet Union. The end of the Cold War eliminated a grave threat. We are richer as a result. Without a major military rival, terrorism by substate actors rose in relative importance. If the Soviet Union still was around intimidating us with its nuclear arsenal, I suspect the threat of terrorism would seem much less frightening.
Second, terrorism is a high-rent problem in the sense that it is perceived as a greater problem by those who live in high-rent districts than those who live in low-rent districts. I can now support this supposition with data. The Gallup Organization regularly asks the American public, “What do you think is the most important problem facing this country today?” (Disclosure: I am a consulting senior scientist to the Gallup Organization.) Gallup provided me with tabulations of the answers to this question by income for approximately 4,000 people for the last four months (August, September, October and November of 2007). This is an open-response question, so the answers are all over the map.
Nevertheless, terrorism is raised as the most important problem less frequently by low-income individuals than by high-income individuals. Only 3.5 percent of people with income of less than $30,000 a year listed terrorism as the nation’s most important problem, while 6.6 percent of those in households earning $75,000 or more listed terrorism as the most important problem. (Those with incomes between $35,000 and $75,000 were in between, with 4.3 percent citing terrorism as the most important problem.) If I did the math right, the difference between the highest- and lowest- income groups is statistically significant at the 1 percent level, which means it is very unlikely to have occurred by chance. If one combines those who responded “national security” with those who mentioned “terrorism”, the gap between the lowest and highest income groups is even bigger: 4.3 percent versus 9.0 percent. Although these differences may appear small, remember that they are responses to an open-ended question. The fact that high-income people are twice as likely to cite terrorism or national security as the nation’s most important problem than are low-income people is significant. A more focused survey question that asked people directly about the risk posed by terrorism is likely to find greater fear of terrorism overall and even larger differences by income.
It is interesting to speculate why terrorism is more likely to be considered the nation’s top problem by higher income people than by lower income people. One possibility is that it is a luxury to think about policy issues like terrorism. The high-income group was also more likely to list Iraq as the country’s most important problem (19.6 percent versus 17.5 percent). The poor may be more worried about bread-and-butter economic issues than terrorism, though the Gallup data surprisingly indicate somewhat more concern about the economy, unemployment and jobs among higher-income respondents.
Another possibility is that the economically advantaged fear for their security because they have more property to potentially lose in a terrorist attack. Additionally, the 9/11 attacks were directed at the rich and powerful, which could heighten the fears of the wealthy. Not all terrorist attacks target the rich, however. In Israel, suicide attacks on buses are a common target, and buses are not a common mode of transportation for the rich.
While security may be a normal good (i.e., a good whose demand rises with income), the Gallup survey found that the lower income respondents were slightly more likely to list crime or violence as the most important problem facing the country. This is probably a reflection of the neighborhoods in which the poor live.
Finally, it is possible that the media and politics play a role. If the well off are more likely to listen to the Republican candidates, they will get a larger dosage of talk about terrorism. Of course, it may also be that such talk resonates with the Republican base, which is why the candidates devote so much time to the issue of terrorism.
For these reasons, it is important keep the risk of terrorism in perspective. In my book, I calculate the risk of dying from terrorism and other causes. The risk of death from a lightning strike for Americans was greater than their risk of death from terrorism in 2005. Yes, the nation needs to be vigilant about terrorism, but we should focus on the most serious threats and not lose our sense of proportion. Colin Powell’s recent admonition in GQ Magazine is worth repeating: “What is the greatest threat facing us now? People will say it’s terrorism. But are there any terrorists in the world who can change the American way of life or our political system? No. Can they knock down a building? Yes. Can they kill somebody? Yes. But can they change us? No. Only we can change ourselves. So what is the great threat we are facing?”
Comments (65)
The fact that high-income people are twice as likely to cite terrorism or national security as the nation’s most important problem than are low-income people is significant.
What's "significant" is that high-income people don't think the rising costs of health care, stagnant wages, impoverished retirements, mortgage foreclosures, and job losses are among the "nation's most important problems." I wonder why.
For high-income people finding any problem at all is a "problem."
November 29, 2007 7:26 AM | Reply | Permalink
if people and policymakers do not over react
Well, the horse is out of THAT barn...
November 29, 2007 8:48 AM | Reply | Permalink
I think you can summarize your finding like this:
The establishment is the group that feels most threatened by those labelled terrorists.
Your posts over the past few days caused me to go through my archive on South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission, in which many people once officially labelled terrorists obtained amnesty through the TRC process.
The best quote however, I have found, came from one of the more unlikely sources, a man called Constand Viljoen, who was a general in the South African army turned conservative politician. He said this:
I still intend to buy your book, but this quote does encapsulate what I regard as the basic cause of terrorism; and by induction, could also explain why it is a high-rent problem.
November 29, 2007 9:15 AM | Reply | Permalink
You closed with "what is the great threat we are facing?" The answer is pretty obvious to me. It is another Republican administration, and a JulieAnnie administration in particular. I have nightmares thinking about that threat.
When you consider what the current administration has done to our country, the threat of terrorism fades to insignificance. So, how about a book about what makes a Republican?
Hoppy in Sacramento
November 29, 2007 9:35 AM | Reply | Permalink
Well, one explanation would be along more-or-less standard Marxist lines: the chief stakeholders, backers and operators of the state are the wealthy, and the state exists largely to protect and extend the interests of its backers. Wealthier individuals closely identify with the state, and view its top financial and security institutions as the guarantors of their own social and economic security. An attack on the power, security and position of the state is correctly perceived as an attack on the power, security and position of its wealthy backers.
Any threat to the prevailing order is going to be felt most by those most heavily invested in that order. Those at the top of a social pyramid are always upset by indications that the natives are getting restless, and respond instinctively with calls to discipline the upstarts and restore order. The Trade Center towers and the Pentagon in 2001 represented not just the pinnacle of the American power pyramid, but given the position of America in the world, also the pinnacle of a global power pyramid. And the wealthy in America are the chief beneficiaries of that power structure, and are most affected materially and emotionally by threats against American majesty.
This is not much different from the the effect of such incidents as the Wall Street bombing in 1920 in front of the J.P. Morgan building. Then the perpetrators were anarchists, but the intent and effect were the same: to strike a blow at the heart of American power and capital and America's financial empire. That bombing threw the growing red scare into high gear, as the nation's ruling class moved to nip revolutionary violence in the bud.
America's wealthy are accustomed to the peoples of the Latin America, Africa and the Middle East playing their established roles as vassals, subordinates and servants. And they know that their own prosperity depends in some way on their position at the top of an exploitative global food chain in which those other peoples occupy much lower links. The wealthy naturally perceived 9/11 as a dangerous and threatening bouleversement - an upsetting of the natural order of things.
November 29, 2007 9:36 AM | Reply | Permalink
For these reasons, it is important keep the risk of terrorism in perspective. In my book, I calculate the risk of dying from terrorism and other causes.
I think it is probably a mistake to think that the primary threat Americans feel from terrorism is the threat of the loss of their own individual lives. It's not clear how many Americans personally feel they are in the line of fire, so to speak. But they associate contemporary terrorism with an enemy of some kind, and regard certain things they hold dear as under attack from that enemy. I mentioned the class and wealth dimensions to the perceived threat, but there are others.
If an American Christianist perceives himself as living in a dark time when his religion is on the retreat globally, and is being supplanted everywhere by an unholy alliance of atheistic European-style secularism, Chinese-style communism and a variety of strange, non-Christian religions; if he perceives America to be one of the last bastions of the rapidly contracting Christian world; if he perceives that even the once dominant Christian character of the United States is in danger from internal moral and spiritual rot; then he is going to perceive an attack by Muslim holy warriors on the citadels of American power as a dire threat - even if he is not worried about himself or his family personally being on the receiving end of a terrorist plane-bomb.
November 29, 2007 9:56 AM | Reply | Permalink
Another reason that the rich respond that terrorism is the major threat to the economy and "our way of life" is that that is exactly the message the rich want to get out, the better to impose fascistic measures to secure their way of life.
November 29, 2007 10:44 AM | Reply | Permalink
But what about financial capital? The wealthy worry about the stock market, the less well-off worry about the food market.
When the stock markets reopened on September 17, 2001, after the longest closure since the Great Depression in 1929, the Dow Jones Industrial Average stock market index fell 684 points, or 7.1%, to 8920, its biggest-ever one-day point decline.
November 29, 2007 10:52 AM | Reply | Permalink
Perhaps not a primary threat, but many people, Americans and non-Americans alike, were afraid to fly.
US air travel decreased significantly after 9/11. The attacks led to nearly a 20% cutback in air travel capacity, and severely exacerbated financial problems in the struggling U.S. airline industry
The number of business and leisure travelers arriving in the United States dropped sharply following the terror attacks of September 11, 2001. The number of non-immigrant visitors fell by more than 17 percent for the period October 2002 to September 2003 (the government’s fiscal year 2003) compared to the number of visitors in fiscal year 2000, and travel to the United States had not recovered even by late 2005.
ecotourism
WeGoEco.com
November 29, 2007 11:01 AM | Reply | Permalink
Why should the obvious be significant?
Since terrorism gets lots of policy-talk time, and since it has savaged civil liberties and skewed foreign policy, it is appropriate to test whether it is in proper perspective. Whether the wealthy care about health care is pretty far off-point.
But it's not surprising, I agree, that the wealthy care more about terrorism than hoi polloi. Wealth was a good predictor of anxiety over communism since it threatened property, also.
November 29, 2007 11:14 AM | Reply | Permalink
Exactly right.
Terrorist attacks are a greater threat to the economy for this group because their wealth is tied to the capital aspects of the economy. If the US suffered wave after wave of attack, capital markets would flee to safer havens, the stock market would drop (the value of their investments with it) and business would look elsewhere for predictability....oh wait, that's already happening with the sub-primes.
The cost to the classes however, is skewed to the middle. When our collective heads clear and Congress decides to do oversight the old fashioned way ("What, Mr. President? We can't have the documents? Well, here's your suh-peeny, see you in court. Oh, and if your underlings don't want to testify? There's a Sergeant-at-Arms over there that will bring 'em up to Capital Hill for ya"), I think we will find that "in the name of Christ-on-a-Crutch, DO SOMETHING, DAMMIT" is the wrong way to appropriate money to fight terrorism. This extravagance won't be sustained by the tax revenues from Wal-Mart much longer. At some point very soon, the credit cards will be cut off and we will have to pay the piper for this mad dance.
Now if you are at the upper end of the scale, the cost of protecting all your stuff is way past the cost for the rest of us, cause, quite frankly, with all the other out of pocket costs goin' on, we just don't get to acquire all that much stuff (unless you count the junk from Wal-Mart as investments...). Which means that the inclination will be for government to increase their revenues to offset the losses from protecting your stuff. And who will be paying that freight? Well, it won't be the "anti-death tax" trust fund fuck whose only worry would really be that he would have to stop buying $500/bottle Cristal when he parties in the Hamptons and start drinking Dom Perignon.
OK, maybe that's a little hyperbolic ;<) but you get the picture. We have collectively blown sooo much cash on "fighting terrorism" here at home (with a questionable return) that we would probably been better off hiring Palestinians at 25K a year just to have them make nice with Israel. Since that little conflict keeps coming up in every conversation about "Mooslim Extremists" as the root cause, for every billion spent in Iraq, we could hire 40,000 Palestinians to do stuff for us. So for ten billion, we could hire almost half a million Palestinians to do stuff in Palestine- start a business, build a road, repair damage, etc. That probably wouldn't stop Bin Laden, but it would take the wind out of a few other middle east sails.
Or, we can keep on sinking that money into the (para) military/industrial complex here at home, on borrowed time, thinking that we are safer and protected- until the next attack. Then we will probably wish we had an earthquake to blame for the mess....
Alphonse ( Al ) Kada
Iranians are fighting the Americans in Iraq so they don't have to fight them on the streets of Tehran
November 29, 2007 12:26 PM | Reply | Permalink
Possible?
The media reacted to 911 and the anthrax mailings like a clutch of Chicken Littles. As for politics, we've all seen the video of how our head of state reacted while 911 was happening. Of course after the initial shock wore off, Buch/Cheney recognized the political advantages of keeping fear levels as high as they can.
It is a little more than possible that the media and politics play a role -- it is certain.
November 29, 2007 12:40 PM | Reply | Permalink
Just the cost of the learning curve.
Prior to the 9/11 hijackings, de rigueur for hijackees was "do nothing". In most cases you would end up in Havana and get a cigar and be home by the weekend. I don't think there will be many now that would sit idly by and not risk a few stitches to save their lives (and possibly many others) now that they know what the "New Rules" are.
As for decreased travel to the US, blame the State Dept. The visa rules tightened so much that even foreign govt employees were regularly turned down.
Alphonse ( Al ) Kada
Iranians are fighting the Americans in Iraq so they don't have to fight them on the streets of Tehran
November 29, 2007 12:56 PM | Reply | Permalink
Hoping I am not disclosing a deep secret of border crossing, I cannot help but share an experience at the US pre-screening entry point in Ottawa. For some reason, my passport and other ID were not at hand; I think I had left them in an airport store and they were being brought to me.
The inspector started asking me various challenging questions, include "Where you were born?"
"Newark, New Jersey".
*stamp* *stamp* "You're cleared. No self-respecting terrorist would admit to something that disgusting. Have a nice flight."
--
Howard
*equal opportunity offense to both extremes*
"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it" [George Santayana]
November 29, 2007 1:03 PM | Reply | Permalink
Some of that might not be due to fear as much as to the fact that, due to all of the terrorism related restrictions, flying has become a very unpleasant pain in the ass. Also, the initial downturn and the increased security costs have caused airlines to cut staffing and reduce service, making flying an even bigger pain in the ass.
November 29, 2007 1:04 PM | Reply | Permalink
Hey, what about those anthrax mailings? We don't hear much about that anymore, do we?
November 29, 2007 1:08 PM | Reply | Permalink
Alphonse,
You know I did my homework. --from a study of post-9/11 travel to the US:
". . .we find that changes in visa policy in the aftermath of 9/11 were not important contributors to the decrease in travel to the United States. Rather, the reduction in entries was largest among travelers who were not required to obtain a visa."
http://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/2952/
ecotourism
WeGoEco.com
November 29, 2007 1:40 PM | Reply | Permalink
*Of course* air travel dropped.
It went from "cattle car" right through "threat down" finally settling solidly into "pain in the ass", with a concomitant increase of 1.5 hours in preparation and "security" time for every flight. To say nothing of the multiple layers of "security" and I can no longer meet my wife at the gate when she arrives home from a trip.
Terrorism? Yeah right. My lifelong savings is going away to the tune of 8% devaluation per year, and the taxes to pay for our adventure in Iraq.
November 29, 2007 1:46 PM | Reply | Permalink
I have no idea what's going on with the wealthy, but I am reminded of some other incidences.
At the height of the Vietnam War protests on occasion demonstrators would gather outside the barricades surrounding the White House. It was either Nixon, Johnson or both who were driven to floor pacing at the sight of them.
It wasn't as though either was threatened with bodily harm, or that either was not aware of the unpopularity of the war and/or them, so what was the reason for the extreme reaction.
My husband and I took part in many demostrations protesting some on-going war - or one about to begin. We were coming from the liberation theology branch of Catholicism so our demonstrations were peaceful, certainly not confrontational.
The reaction from passing motorists was everything from thumbs up to thumbs down to the 'bird' to hysterical red-faced motorists screaming, "Go back to Russia." It was that latter group which I never figured out because their reaction was as though we were physically threatening their very existence.
November 29, 2007 1:48 PM | Reply | Permalink
Dan,
We all have our own "pain in the ass" thresholds but I travel long distances a fair amount and I don't find it to be a PITA at all, and not "definitely unpleasant" either.
One can now hop aboard a flight at LAX (or JFK and Logan, for the stay-behinds) and get off the plane in Paris, London or Beijing--who could ask for anything more? The food's not bad, either, and being vegetarian I always get served first.
Of course, since you've known me for awhile, you know that I'm somewhat of a PITA myself so there's a natural accommodation there.
November 29, 2007 1:53 PM | Reply | Permalink
You get food?
November 29, 2007 2:28 PM | Reply | Permalink
This is no surprise. Read any story by John Cheever or John Updike or watch any movie by Woody Allen and you'll realize that high rent people are neurotic. Fear of terrorism is a perfect candidate for neurosis.
thosethingswesay.blogspot.com
November 29, 2007 2:31 PM | Reply | Permalink
"standard Marxist lines"
This is very perceptive. I think it also helps to explain the views of middle class people who are not actually wealthy.
On the other hand, those of use who have experienced the instability of middle class life in modern times may see things differently.
Some middle class people who are becoming aware of the instability of their life-style may cling to a conservative philosophy that they think is responsibile for their former security. Others may read the situation in the opposite way.
November 29, 2007 2:38 PM | Reply | Permalink
I have read that Christianity is actually growing in the Third World, although it is possible that fact does not register very strongly with Americans. American Catholics may be aware of it, because Americans do not have much voice in the Catholic Church and the Church hierarchy does not have much motivation to adapt to the minority American tastes.
Also, there is no such thing as a "Christianist", for the same reason that there is no such thing as a "Democrat Party" or an "Islamo-Fascist."
It is hard for me to imagine Europe getting any more secular than it already is, so I do not see how anyone could perceive that as a threat.
This is a small point, but I happen to know that the Christian Scientists did not formerly have a presence in Marseilles, but now they do, as the corruption in the city has been cleaned up.
Are conservative Christians paranoid? - sure, but that does not require much explanation. Being paranoid is part of the conservative temperament. At this site it also seems to be part of the liberal temperament.
I think we should focus our paranoia on more tangible targets, like, everything you can mention about the Bush administration.
November 29, 2007 2:41 PM | Reply | Permalink
And I am reminded that we'll not see that again. No matter how innocuous the Quakers assembled near the seat of power, they will be kept out of sight of either the White House or Congress.
November 29, 2007 2:47 PM | Reply | Permalink
Well, I'm no Marxist, but just because a Marxist says the world is round doesn't make it flat.
The fact is the US was established as a plutocracy to a large extent, we've had a few extremely plutocratic eras, and we do have a great deal of plutocratic behavior to this day.
Which isn't to say it's all bad either. Some of that is legitimate meritocracy, the best and brightest contributing the most and getting the biggest share of the pie.
But there is always a balancing act between community and individual trying to find some optimal outcome, which can be measured basically in two ways: 1) quality of life (present day happiness quotient) and 2) economic growth (potential future happiness quotient).
In my opinion, much of the country feels we're busted in both regards. Too much wealth is being held by the investor class rather than distributed to the working class, which is harming their quality of life. Furthermore, much of that wealth is then being invested elsewhere, jobs outsourced, and so on, which is also harming their future prosperity and that of their children.
Adding insult to injury, the investor class often portrays themselves as global humanitarians, lauding themselves for job creation in China or India, which has the irony of capitalists arguing the moral superiority of wealth distribution away from those who created it towards investment in those who haven't, as a moral good, which last time I checked was called socialism.
November 29, 2007 3:15 PM | Reply | Permalink
They'll feed you if you leave the country, which is not the emotional issue it used to be.
November 29, 2007 3:34 PM | Reply | Permalink
Terrorism is naturally a concern of the high-rent crowd. Security is a growth industry.
And an industry which almost assures lucrative contracts with no oversight.
Those with money to invest are very worried that terrorism will cease to be a primary concern. It's the goose that lays golden eggs for them, and concern about security is the primary way to avoid financial and legal oversight today. That's why they love it.
As far as I can see,large houses are still being built with huge expanses of glass, multiple entrances and as much land around them as possible. Those are not people who are worried about terrorism.
One of the worst ways to find out what people think about something is to ask them. It's a lot better to see what they do. And what, exactly, are the rich doing about this worry about terrorism?
I think it would be more accurate to say that the affluent are very concerned about getting and keeping the public scared of "terrorists". Cause it's a profit-making fear!
November 29, 2007 3:39 PM | Reply | Permalink
That anthrax stuff is old news, deader than the five postal workers and that old lady in New England. For one thing no Muslims seemed to be involved. Also, Bush and White House staff started on anti-anthrax CIPRO a week before the first anthrax letter was mailed-but so what? OK, maybe they could have let on to Leahy & Daschle....
Jun 7, 2002
Judicial Watch Wants to Know Why White House Went on Cipro Beginning September 11th
What Was Known and When?
November 29, 2007 4:09 PM | Reply | Permalink
Don, from the Discover America Partnership (a group of business leaders partnered to strengthen the US image worldwide):
11/06 International Travel Survey -
And from an article in the UK Sunday Times on 9/06:
Treating foreign journalists badly hasn't helped our image either.
Smethurst wasn't alone in learning about LAX's new journalist-visa enforcement the hard way. A month before, reporter Rachael Bletchley of the British newspaper The People "was held for 26 hours, was handcuffed for a time, was given very little to eat or drink, had no possibility of sleep and had to ask permission to use the lavatory, which was denied on at least one occasion," according to a protest letter to Tom Ridge, the Homeland Security Secretary, sent by the World Association of Newspapers.
...the delusional is no longer marginal. It has come in from the fringe, to sit in the seat of power in the Oval Office and in Congress. Bill Moyers
November 29, 2007 6:13 PM | Reply | Permalink
Seashell,
deleted--I'm not sure that my figures were for air travel. Anyhow, my point was that there was a decrease in air travel after 9/11. Different factors apply now. Can we call it a day?
November 29, 2007 8:40 PM | Reply | Permalink
Those figures click with my personal traveling experience as an American, as well as what I've heard from many American and foreign travelers.
Just earlier this week I was sent to special screening by TSA on a return flight from Hawaii, for having a renewal driver's license which was deemed insufficient ID. That, after two previous TSA reps had found no problem with it.
The first TSA rep looked in her early 20's, had a wrinkled and ill fitting uniform, and was gossiping with another TSA employee while checking my documents, joking "bitch, why didn't you invite me" to a previous outing. None the less, she waved me through.
The second TSA rep seemed more professional, was in his mid 30's, and noticed I had neglected to sign my DMV renewal slip to authorize it. Which is obviously a silly technicality, as my signature is already on the license, and on other paperwork, and nobody seriously compares signatures, as opposed to pictures, anyways. The second TSA employee told me I'd have to sign it, or be sent to special screening, which I did. And he let me through. Again, not sure if he was bending the rules or if it was just a gray area, but he certainly showed more professionalism and common sense in his demeanor and attention than other TSA reps.
The third TSA rep wasn't even in uniform, but in street clothes with a pocket badge. She was a good 250 lbs, and gossiping and joking with her coworkers while screening people. After a glance at my ID, shap appeared to make a snap decision that it was insufficient, after being accepted by two other TSA screeners, and directed me to the special screening line. Where, I waited for over 15 minutes repeatedly waving to get their attention, and being told they'd be right with me. While two of the four uniformed screeners were apparently on break. Finally, aver waing again, a screener noticed me, clearly for the forst time, and hurried over to screen me. It was clear his coworkers who had seen me hadn't told him I was waiting.
At which point he gave me mumbled directions, often waiting till I had done something before telling me I couldn't. For example, he indicated I should move, but didn't indicate where to walk, so I gestured for him to lead, when he then told me I'd have to walk in front of him. I finally had to ask him where, before he told me. At another point he told me we're all done, so I reached for my shoes, at which point he told me he wasn't done with those, and I couldn't touch them yet, as he'd still have to swipe them.
All in all it was a mildly irritating experience which I joked off, but I did feel especially sorry for an elderly woman behind me who was being frisked, and whose eyes were beginning to cry, and who was literally shaking as she stood there with her arms up, for what imaginary offense or profile I can only imagine.
I've seen some TSA reps who have the professionalism or real law enforcement. However, the training of *most* TSA reps isn't anywhere close to that of other law enforcement, and seems more on the level of the DMV, or worse, as the DMV seems to be improving. In fact, I believe many of them are simply the same low paid baggage checkers doing a sloppy and unmotivated job before 9/11, only with a new badge.
Add that to the fact American airlines often overbook, have delayed flight, and no customer rights, and that many of our airports don't physically have space for checkpoints, it's no wonder people dislike flying in the USA. I've always found the level of professionalism, courteousness, and efficiency of European and Japanese carriers and security to be far higher.
November 29, 2007 9:07 PM | Reply | Permalink
As a single guy who has traveled alone, sometimes on short notice, I've been "Selected for extra screening" a few times. It only kind of bugs me and has always been a fast process and somewhat funny. But every time it's happened there's an old man or woman in the same line and you're right -- the oldsters freak about it. Honestly, I think it really is that those of us in our 20s or 30s have a totally different relationship to uniformed authority than older people do. It's kind of traumatic for them.
But then, they see a TSA person and they see a cop. I see them the way you do -- I see a barely promoted baggage handler. Sorry, that's what I see because that's really what they are. As some time passes, I think you'll see some pushback from passengers. Certainly consumer complaints and maybe lawsuits.
thosethingswesay.blogspot.com
November 29, 2007 9:16 PM | Reply | Permalink
I was actually with my wife, but in general I've found the more either uptight or lackadasical the screener, the more likely they're going to flag you for additional screening. I guess the lazy ones are just too stupid an incompetant to show good judgement, and figure CYA. While the TSA zealots seem to imagine they're single handedly saving America by being as maximally prejudiced and tightly wound as possible.
Imo, any screening system which pits law enforcement against the ordinary public is bound to fail, unless every procedure is regimented to the nth degree, and only specially skilled and reasonable supervisors are left to make judgment calls. Clearly the vast majority of TSA employees have either no motivation, aptitude, or training to make judgment calls that are anything but arbitrary.
Just as most cops eventually come to see bad guys everywhere, and most military tend to see enemies and opportunities for escalation of force everywhere, TSA will inevitably be in an adversarial position to the public.
But the difference is that a large percentage of people the police deal with have actually done something criminal, and even still there are often abuses of power. The military isn't supposed to be in policing situations, and when they are the results are often disastrous. But TSA by nature deals with everyone, and 99.999% of those people are going to be innocent. Then, given the arbitrariness of some screening procedures, it's inevitable individual bias and "gut checks" start profiling without regard to good policy.
November 29, 2007 9:34 PM | Reply | Permalink
You know what interests me more than the ranking differences between rich cohorts and poor? No group ranked the terror threat higher than single digits! This is remarkable for the attack that supposedly changed everything and all the mass hysteria that ensued.
My explanation for the difference is that, being better able to afford cable TV, rich folk are more likely to watch Fox News, which practically defines itself by a perpetual state of high freak about terrorists and liberals.
November 29, 2007 10:08 PM | Reply | Permalink
International flight is generally better, although it's certainly far more professional and efficient on the foreign side than on the American side, in every developed country I've flown to.
Japan is beautifully efficient and professional, often speak English and other languages, and do their jobs quickly and clearly without unnecessary harassment or attitude. And they're actually professional and courteous. But that's not surprising considering Japanese train and pay service and other public sector jobs better, which in part they're able to do without economic disadvantage due to more efficient health care and benefits, which just like in their auto manufacturing results in a huge cost savings which can then be applied to superior staffing and quality control.
While American service and security workers are usually barely getting by, lucky to have benefits, probably have a crappy HMO that denies them much preventative, and still eats up a large chunk of their paycheck which then comes directly out of training, benefits, and decompression vacation time for themselves. And of course American companies lobby against wage and training standards to cut their costs, and in the end the consumer pays.
Additionally, many US law enforcement are former military, still acting out military style training in a civilian role as professional training in the US is cost cut compared with other developed nations. Also, they're often juggled and prevented from accruing pensions or seniority, so they tend to have lower levels of motivation as well.
I've found American Customs can be really incompetent and downright disgruntled and nasty. I once had a custom's agent with a buzzcut, a too tight uniform showing bulging biceps, and other indications of aggressive personality, who seemed very tightly wound in her body language and speech. I couldn't believe it when she asked me with a smirk if I liked *child porn* as she rifled through my luggage! Because, according to her, it was a big problem in Japan that she had to be on the lookout for. Which was just totally unprofessional and frankly kind of crazy.
She was clearly on a psycho head trip and had issues. Unfortunately that kind of person in TSA and Customs seems fairly common: the angry, Napoleon complex type with a huge chip on their shoulder, who gets a badge and a little power and then abuses it, often underpaid, under supervised, and under trained as well.
Domestic is a mess, with flights routinely canceled, delayed, incompetent TSA and service, and so on. Overall our deregulated airlines are a total mess of cost cutting, incompetent underpaid and under trained workers, carrier collusion to screw customers and protect regional hubs, and so on.
November 29, 2007 10:16 PM | Reply | Permalink
It's all about the oil, and the money, near as I can tell. Ethanol burns, too...
November 29, 2007 11:45 PM | Reply | Permalink
Off thread, but out of curiosity, how did you come across this reference located on a University of Munich library server, and if it wasn't through the front-door of The Munich Personal RePEc Archive, did you backtrack up the URL to see what else was available in the repository? How data flows within the streams fascinates me.
November 29, 2007 11:47 PM | Reply | Permalink
I agree with you here but there's no need to throw in volitile word like Marxist. This conflict between societies and between the classes (yes there are even classes here in America) is a common denominator to all civilizations & cultures dating back thousands of years.
It is ultimately protectionism. Terrorism is not so much a moral issue, as most would lead us to believe, but rather a status quo issue. It's easy to say that people where more barbaric 1000 or 2000 years ago when similar conflicts and atrocities occured. Or even that the people in a distant land which are not on par with us are. But really the only differences between the past & present are the #'s of people involved & the technology at our disposal. Arguing 'humanitarian' or 'terrorist' is a farce and easily shown as such. A quick example are embargos. How exactly does starving a people and casting them into fatal poverty win anything? How can you punish a leader & his inner circle at the expense of so manny innocent victims? It certainly doesn't score high on the humanitarian scale & I think all would agree. Yet here is a country (us, the United States) that does exactly this. Where is our morality and humanitarian concern then?
Conflict breeds atrocity. This is fact. And any country which supports & prospers from conflict commits atrocity by simply taking this position and acting in this manner. So with the 'moral ground' literally ripped from beneath our feet, how can we stand in judgement? I do not support terrorism any more than I do murder (which it is). But how can we sit here debating the morality of the actions of humanity in desperation while commiting no less barbarous acts? We do so to survive... So that OUR way endures. Do they not do the same?
I'm a glass house person. History has shown that when those that have take too much at the expense of all, people die. Lots of people. And those that do not have fight back in any way they can. It's always brutal. It's always ugly. And it always happens. It's true now as it was 2 or 3 thousand years ago - some things never change. But until we begin behaving in a truely civilized manner I with not accept that we have any higher moral ground from which to defend ourselves or attack anyone else. We are just as barbarous but chose to alter our thinking (and the dictionary) in order to justify it to ourselves.
November 30, 2007 12:06 AM | Reply | Permalink
I understand your point here about being Marxist being a volatile word, but you are also, to some extent, dealing with economic issues. When responding to a post that seems to equate terrorism with radical Islam, which certainly uses it, I do make a point of using examples of terror from across the ideological, religious/secular, and other spectra. When I can point to both a Latin American Marxist and an Asian nationalist who tries to trigger overreaction, I think it helps people check their assumptions.
--
Howard
*equal opportunity offense to both extremes*
"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it" [George Santayana]
November 30, 2007 12:16 AM | Reply | Permalink
Only 3.5 percent of people with income of less than $30,000 a year listed terrorism as the nation’s most important problem, while 6.6 percent of those in households earning $75,000 or more listed terrorism as the most important problem.
perhaps the poor see "the rich" as terrorists... Nietzsche wrote about "resentment,"
The slave morality concept of Good vs. Evil involves resentment. This is resentment on the part of the slaves towards the nobles. The slaves have a enormous grudge against the nobles. The slaves dislike the fact the nobles’ posses wealth, power and social status. source
and I see "resentment" as the reason why people rebelled against the Jews:
With regards to 9/11, a CBS/NyTimes poll (source) found that more than half the country believed that the government was "hiding something" while about 28% though that government officials were lying about everything.
i.e. there's so much "psychological terror" coming down from the White House and MSM these days that people feel physically sick and see those "in power" as boogie men and women.
To boldly go...
November 30, 2007 12:20 AM | Reply | Permalink
Thank you so much for your article Alan and thank god that we're starting to disucss this issue. I'm really glad I dropped in today as I've been contemplating just that and trying to put this 'terrorist threat' into perspective in historical terms. It occured to me today that I'm getting kinda sick and tired of hearing about it since, after all, we've had one...one terrorist attack on the nation. Now, certainly, a spectacularly destructive one and I don't mean to belittle the terrible human cost and damage to the national psyche that it's caused but after all, there has only been just one. I remember even within a few days of the attacks, (like most of us I think) shuddering at the thought of the inevitable follow-ups and what form they might take (will it be suicide bombers in shopping malls next? etc) But to this day, just one. It's still a fixture in the nightly news broadcasts, (be wary of such and such and so and so) Of course, notwithstanding the billions of attacks that the Bush government has prevented and the hundreds of thousands of sleeper cells they've uncovered and the gazillion convictions they've wrested out of the courts, but still, just one. So are we, at this point, really grossly inflating this terrorist threat? Are we just terrorizing ourselves?
Republicans are people too.....mean, selfish, greedy people
November 30, 2007 2:19 AM | Reply | Permalink
True enough Howard.
It's interesting. As I mentioned on another thread, I've recently started reading The Greek Achievement - The Foundation of the Western World by Charles Freeman and as often happens, I noticed something in it that seemed relevant to todays world.
It seems that in the early stages of what would become Greece there were several city-states which controled the surrounding resources they needed to survive. These were generally peaceful times. But as these cities grew they needed more. More room and more resource. And as there where vast 'unsettled' areas available they spread out & colonized. And still there was relative peace. But as the numbers continued to grow, and the locations on which to build sucessful satellite cities in order to capitalize on the resources dwindled...fighting began.
There were of course people living at many of the places selected for colonization. They were either absorbed, dispatched in short order, or ocassionally allowed to co-exist (if conditions allowed). The general cruelty of growth and modernity is an old reality. Of course growth and modernity need to be fed, and trade and the money it generates is what they eat. And of course economics, and all it's various components, plays a role in establishing a civic order and unity. The importance of this is obvious. The process is a bit more complicated today but not terribly so, the basic principles remain. And as always there exists within this economic beast, classes. And in the cyclical nature of thing those on the bottom tire of that rank and desire change. It is almost always achieved violently.
I think economics definitely play a powerful role in the state of the world today. I'm just not so dramatic about the causes & effects as some are. And there nothing we've done outside Manifest Destiny that's been quite as dramatic as this little GWOT. It's a hoax of a hoax. And to me it only goes to further demonstrate just how out of touch with reality our nation has become.
November 30, 2007 2:57 AM | Reply | Permalink
That the threat of terrorism has been grossly inflated is hard to deny when the Illinois Apple and Pork Festival is included as a possible target in the DHS terrorism database, or local chicken farmers in Delmarva come under stringent reporting requirements for propane use.
But this administration is guilty of more than just gross inflation of the terrorist threat. By conflating a nuclear Iran with Hizbollah in Lebanon, Hamas in Israel, Syrian aspirations and Al-Qaeda in Iraq, Bush has created as a threat an organized extremist movement that doesn't exist, except in the neocon's imaginations. The blowback from that particular strategy is not only more fear, but the making of more enemies than what we started with on Sept. 11th.
The Professor calculated that lightening strikes will do in more individual Americans than terrorists. On the national level, a new report issued by the Center for Strategic and International Studies, Smart Power, said that terrorists pose no existential threat to the United States. (pdf p.11)
By the way, You left out the number three Al-Qaeda guy that we've also killed a gazillion times. :-)
...the delusional is no longer marginal. It has come in from the fringe, to sit in the seat of power in the Oval Office and in Congress. Bill Moyers
November 30, 2007 4:58 AM | Reply | Permalink
When talking to an activist who is trying to get Democrats in Texas to come out to vote, I realized that there is a very significant difference in the breadth of worldview between most of the wealthier people I know and those who are working class.
The policy stuff we discuss here is generally considered more important by the wealthier classes. The less wealthy have priorities that are more immediate, more geographically local and less abstract. The threat of the relatively minor (to most of us) problem of terrorism might be pretty big if your income depends on selling investments that might be effected by the next terrorist attack. But if you are concerned about being laid off because your company is facing lower sales (or is having trouble paying both the growing CEO paycheck and dividends at the same time out of shrinking revenue - got to cut labor wages again to afford the important stuff.)
Then, in the mostly poor neighborhood that is immediately across the tracks from my home, the real issue that matters is the latest series of robberies that have recently occurred in one strip shopping mall.
Notice the narrowing of the geographic spread of the issues. It correlates with income of the families.
The abstractness of threats has a similar arc related to family income and wealth. I have never met a jihadist (although I may have met some Free Texas Republic terrorists a few years ago.) But I have been robbed, I was scammed a couple of weeks ago by a young guy with a rather clear muscular definition that I have only seen on people who spent time in prison weight rooms, and both of my next door neighbors have been burglarized in the last two years (I have dogs.) People with more wealth see greater threats in abstract threats than do people with less wealth or less reliable incomes.
Alan's description of wealthy people being more likely to consider terrorism a threat fits this narrowing of breadth of view of what priority threats are as the amount and reliability of family income decreases.
The kinds of policy-wonk discussions we enjoy here describe problems and threats that are more likely to be important to wealthy people who are more likely to vote Republican. The issues that are really important to the more likely Democratic voters are, as far as I can tell, those caused or made worse by the wealthy Americans. Either those Republicans want total freedom to use and dispose of labor with minimum pay and no benefits totally at will, or they want to prevent any rational government programs like universal health care that is primarily of importance to families with lower and more unreliable income.
Unfortunately for Democratic politicians, it is difficult to communicate those abstract issues as immediate threats to likely Democratic voters. This is especially true because those same Democratic politicians have to raise so damned much money just to get elected, so they can't point at the money-donors they are dependent on and explain why they are the source of most of the problems faced by Democratic voters.
I think that Alan's insight that terrorism is considered a greater threat by the wealthy than by those with less wealth and less reliable income fits in with this problem. I suspect it is one source of the difficulty of getting Democratic voter turnout here in Texas, and probably nationally.
November 30, 2007 7:56 AM | Reply | Permalink
A bribe? Leave the country and we'll feed you? What kind of a PITA are you, anyway?
Can I join? Are there PITA T-shirts? :-}
November 30, 2007 8:17 AM | Reply | Permalink
I find the constant pressure by conservative Bapitists and Jehova's Witnesses to convert to their cult of Bible worship, or the corresponding shunning I get when I refuse their gracious gestures, both disgusting and exhausting. Oklahoma is worse than Texas.
I have a right to my paranoia. They really ARE out to get me!
November 30, 2007 8:57 AM | Reply | Permalink
My point though seashell (I was asking a question that most knew the answer to here) is that it just has me wondering; do these Republican officals (and of course, Joe Lieberman) truly perceive this threat to be as dire as they seem to publicly proclaim it is? Or are they privately laughing it up in the cloak room on another success in keeping their base Pavlovian? As little benefit of the doubt that I'm willing to give this Administration about anything anymore, (and as megalomaniacal as Joe Lieberman is) I really think that they believe the threat is this dire; Neo-McCarthyites if you will.
Republicans are people too.....mean, selfish, greedy people
November 30, 2007 9:12 AM | Reply | Permalink
It's almost always both.
People who fear monger (or other demagogues) see it validated and reinforced by success. And of course it's very difficult for them to consider they could be wrong, because they have a reputation and financial stake in being right.
The realization one is wrong, take for example Jack Abramoff and Tom Delay perhaps realizing the Marianna islands aren't a capitalist utopia but slave labor camps, or Ken Lay and Skilling realizing ENRON was a pyramid scam, would actually take the intellectual integrity to think it through and the rectitude to admit it and stop. Demagogues, especially successful ones, quickly learn to block off any line of thought they find unpleasant.
It's a flocking mechanism, and feedback loop. Like lemmings, they almost always keep going until completely over the cliff. 'Cause the mind is a terrible thing.
November 30, 2007 10:42 AM | Reply | Permalink
I sympathize. As the saying goes, even paranoids have real enemies.
Nowadays I am beginning to think of myself as an independent. I am not comfortable with the traditional Enlightenment tendency to categorize things. I have lived in both the Bible Belt and two of the largest cities of the North. I get along with conservative Christians better than one might expect, considering that I do not use any of their language. On the other hand, I can relate to Karl Barth, who felt that the conventional liberal Christianity of his day was limiting.
November 30, 2007 11:14 AM | Reply | Permalink
Lightening strikes for sure and I particularly liked the statistic that I and/or any member of my family had a better chance of being hit by a meteorite than by a terrorist.
November 30, 2007 11:33 AM | Reply | Permalink
One of my mother's psychiatrist colleagues commissioned a framed sampler to be made for the wall of his personal home study. It adds perspective to many situations, with due correction for the populations involved.
In his case, it read, "The Paranoids are out to get me."
--
Howard
*equal opportunity offense to both extremes*
"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it" [George Santayana]
November 30, 2007 11:48 AM | Reply | Permalink
Calls to mind the Diabolicals of "Foucault's Pendulum".
November 30, 2007 1:35 PM | Reply | Permalink
No offense, but how do we know you're not actually a Freudian psychologist with delusions about your mother and her non-existent psychologist friends, and their non-existent artwork?
And as my mother's Freudian psychologist always likes to say, if it ain't falsifiable, it must be true.
November 30, 2007 2:08 PM | Reply | Permalink
There is a Migra checkpoint north of me, near the south end of the Salton Sea. So I drive through it one day, and the officer asks me "Where are you from." I answered "San Francisco, California" (where I was born). He just stared at me for the longest time - it was a bit akward. Finally he asked "Where are you going?" I told him I had an appointment in Riverside, and he finally waved me through. Back on the road it hit me what had gone wrong. The officer was a Mexican guy from the valley (everyone speaks Spanglish around here) so what he meant was of course "where are you coming from?" I then started to imagine what was going through his mind. How did I get all the way down there heading north from SF?
Neoboho
November 30, 2007 3:04 PM | Reply | Permalink
I confess. I am merely Pavlovian, trained by the dogs to ring bells when they have thoughts of salivating.
Do you have any idea what it is like for either dogs or behavioral psychologists, with Christmas season bells ringing everywhere?
--
Howard
*equal opportunity offense to both extremes*
"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it" [George Santayana]
November 30, 2007 3:09 PM | Reply | Permalink
What did the behaviorist say to her husband after sex?
"It was obviously good for you; was it good for me, also?"
November 30, 2007 3:47 PM | Reply | Permalink
This discussion reminds me of an incident years ago in Northern California. The Pacific Gas & Electric had applied to the PUC for a rate increase, and it ended up in a meeting between the commissioner, Bill Bennet, and Shermer Sibley, PG&E's president.
Bennet: "Mr. Sibley, don't you think a rate increase would be inflationary?"
Sibley: "No, I believe it would be deflationary!"
Bennet: "How would that work?"
Sibley: "Because it would limit the amount of money the public has for discretionary spending!"
It seems to me that is something near the basis for the middle class polling "terrorism" as the country's numero uno problem - I think we're using the wrong terms here. "National response to terrorism" is more apt, I think. It strikes me as obvious that familes that are secure - mortgage affordable, nest-eggs in place, private health insurance and so forth have the privelege of worrying about something that is eating away at their discretionary spending power. Conversley, poorer American live from paycheck to paycheck, so they worry about the monthly bills, health costs, and so on. Since discretionary spending is really out of the picture anyway, it makes sense the gargantuan expense of fighting terrorism isn't as vital an issue.
Neoboho
November 30, 2007 3:51 PM | Reply | Permalink
Whether terrorism is a high-rent worry, it sure seems to be a high-rent business opportunity, with venture capital for security and defense outstripping clean technologies, according to Naomi Klein, who spoke to Douglas Lloyd of Venture Business Research.
November 30, 2007 3:53 PM | Reply | Permalink
Only psychologists are permitted to be fantasies. [See note below]
Psychiatrists, being Medical Doctors, are by definition real.
[Note - that's be fantasies, not have fantasies. Both psychologists and psychiatrists are all working out their own problems through their choice of profession. Just ask them after some beer or wine when their inhibitions are down.]
November 30, 2007 4:01 PM | Reply | Permalink
Having moved to a different area, I really miss my podiatrist. Technically, she was superb. I have mixed feelings since she is the only health care practitioner I know who almost invariably beat me to the punch line of my medical jokes.
Still, we agreed that the two of us were working through an odd mixture of Cinderella and other tales. After having an incredibly beautiful woman trying to fit things to my feet, I always was afraid that when I got out to the parking lot, my car would have been replaced by a giant pumpkin. Does anyone have the fuel economy figures for a Jeep Pumpkin?
--
Howard
*equal opportunity offense to both extremes*
"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it" [George Santayana]
November 30, 2007 4:50 PM | Reply | Permalink
Alternatively, psychotics build castles in the sky. Neurotics wish they could live in castles in the sky. Therapists collect the rent.
--
Howard
*equal opportunity offense to both extremes*
"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it" [George Santayana]
November 30, 2007 4:51 PM | Reply | Permalink
Sorry, tonto_cal, it was the only way I could get the Apple and Pork Festival into a paragraph. :-)
...the delusional is no longer marginal. It has come in from the fringe, to sit in the seat of power in the Oval Office and in Congress. Bill Moyers
November 30, 2007 6:15 PM | Reply | Permalink
lol. How true.
And from an evolutionary psychology point of view, let me just say this has been a wonderful session of back scratching and bonding.
oops. Not funny. Damn evolutionary psychology!
November 30, 2007 8:32 PM | Reply | Permalink
Don-
I'm sure you did, and after reading through the 47 or so mind-numbing pages of the graph, you should get an "A" just for the effort.
My info comes mostly in an anecdotal way, but from very reliable sources. Most of the international visitors that I deal with coming from the Middle-East/North Africa region have told me very directly that the have not been returning because of the increased rules. Not that they are not willing to go through some additional hoops to comply, but:
1. One type of short term student visa used by businessmen to attend conferences, etc. was eliminated and the only student visa's available required an HIV/AIDS test (as if the person applying would be resident for four years or more)
2. The photographing and fingerprinting at the arriving airport was a big turn-off initially for long standing visa holders.
3. The increased time for visa interviews in their country went up dramatically as checks were re-done for long standing visa holders.
4. Many found the process so onorous that they selected other seminars and classes in UK or EU countries rather than go through the increased processes.
Most of the people that I deal with are government employees of their respective countries and most are high-level. So if it was difficult for them, think what it might be like for a tourist- hell, think what it's been like for those in this country to get a passport!
Same people running both ends.....
Alphonse ( Al ) Kada
Iranians are fighting the Americans in Iraq so they don't have to fight them on the streets of Tehran
December 1, 2007 9:32 AM | Reply | Permalink