An airports debacle worsened by greed and neglect
Britain's current airport debacle is the predictable and predicted outcome of ill-conceived airport privatisation. Some things - steel mills for example - can be easily privatised; others cannot, as America's problems in contracting security arrangements made clear. The problems Britain has encountered in privatising its railroads show that, at the very least, extreme care must be taken in the privatisation of vital public services.
During the Clinton administration, privatisation of the US air traffic control system was hotly debated, and while aspects of privatising air traffic control systems and airports are not identical, they are sufficiently similar that the analysis may be relevant here. The US Council of Economic Advisers, of which I was a member and then chairman, after careful analysis, expressed strong reservations partly because airports (and air traffic control systems) are almost inevitably virtual or actual monopolies. It is just too risky to privatise an entity that will not face competition. The UK airports crisis, triggered by the recent discovery of a terrorist plot to blow up aircraft, showed the mismatch between the interests of a private operator and those of users - both the airlines and, more importantly, their customers.
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Passenger safety and security are of course paramount. The problem has been disappointing management by BAA, the UK airport operator, in normal times, and its disastrous handling of the recent crisis. Flights were cancelled and delayed largely because BAA lacked sufficient trained staff for security checks. If it takes three minutes to X-ray a suitcase, then it takes three minutes whether it is done an hour before a flight is supposed to leave or three hours later. The only reason for delays would be the decision by airport authorities to keep passengers waiting rather than spend money on extra ???-personnel to process them quickly. There is an incompatibility of incentives, and because airports are a monopoly there is no competition to force it to change.
The magnitude of the debacle can be seen by recognising the value of lost time: if the average passenger makes just ￡10 an hour, and wastes one hour queuing, and if some 68m passengers pass through Heathrow a year, then the value of the lost time is ￡680m - quite a dent in profits if BAA had to compensate passengers for lost time. And it would quickly realise that it could greatly shorten queues by hiring more security personnel and buying more screening devices - at a fraction of that cost.
In an ideal world, a well-designed contract would, of course, have BAA bear these costs, so it would face appropriate incentives. But in the rush to privatise, too little attention has been paid to these finer points. Without appropriate incentives, a private operator bears the cost of additional personnel and equipment, but gets none of the benefit. The inexorable drive for profit maximisation leads to excessive economisation; BAA's profits rise at the expense of airline profits and consumer welfare; and society is worse off. The seeming disdain BAA shows for customers and users is what one might expect from a monopolist.
Too often, the debate has centred around two polar institutional arrangements, government ownership versus privatisation. There are alternatives, such as corporatisation with significant ownership by airlines but continuing safety oversight by government. The airlines, as owners, would be sensitive not only to the direct impact on their profits, but the indirect impact as a result of unhappy customers who chose alternative modes of transportation. And the airlines, themselves, would be sensitive to safety - all know what an accident does to air travel.
This blind and simplistic faith in markets was, perhaps, understandable in the Thatcher years; it is less so now. The current crisis should make incontrovertible what has been evident to any user of UK's airports: something is wrong and must be fixed. Co-operative corporatisation is one way; there are others. The complaint against governments running airports is that theyare insufficiently accountable to users - in balancing the interests of tax???-payers and users, they put too much weight on the savings to taxpayers and too little weight on the convenience of users. With privatisation, there is accountability - but only to shareholders. What is clear is that unless incentives are better aligned, privatisation will continue to be a disappointment.
The writer received the 2001 Nobel Prize in economics and chaired the US Council of Economic Advisers under President Clinton; his latest book, Making Globalisation Work, is published this month by WW Norton and Penguin
英国机场乱局：私有化败笔
英
国目前的机场乱局，是考虑不周的机场私有化行动可预见的结果，且早在预言之中。有些企业（比如说钢铁厂）可以很容易地私有化，有些则不能，美国在签署安保协议时遇到的问题就证明了这一点。最起码，英国在铁路私有化时遇到的问题表明，在关键的公共服务领域进行私有化，必须极度谨慎。
在克林顿(Clinton)执政时期，美国空中交通控制系统的私有化问题曾引发激烈的争论。虽然空中交通控制系统的私有化与机场私有化不同，但它们在很多方面非常相似，因此，相关分析或许也适用于机场私有化。我曾在美国总统经济顾问委员会(US Council of Economic Advisers)历任委员、主席职务。该委员会在认真分析之后，对空中交通控制系统的私有化表达了强烈的保留意见，部分原因是，机场（和空中交通控制系统）几乎无法避免其事实上的垄断特性。对一个不会遭遇竞争的实体进行私有化，这实在太危险了。因发现恐怖分子炸飞机的阴谋，英国机场最近出现危机，显示出其私人经营者与使用者（航空公司及它们的顾客，而后者更为重要）之间的利益并不一致。
旅客的安全当然最为重要。而问题在于，作为英国机场的运营商，英国机场管理局(BAA)不仅正常情况下的管理令人失望，在最近危机中的表现也是糟糕透顶。航班被取消或者延误，主要是因为英国机场管理局缺少足够的熟练员工用于安检。如果用X光检查一只手提箱需要3分钟，那么不论是在航班起飞之前一小时，还是已经被延误3小时，检查所需时间都是3分钟。延误的唯一原因是，英国机场管理局决定宁可让旅客等候，也不花钱额外雇用员工以提高安检速度。让旅客等候，或花钱提高速度，这两种动机无法共存，而且因为机场是垄断事业，没有竞争迫使其做出改变。
通过计算时间损耗的价值，我们可以看到这种糟糕局面的影响有多大：如果平均每位乘客每小时挣10英镑，平均排队浪费1小时，每年大约6800万旅客通过希思罗机场(Heathrow)，那么，这一年的时间损耗价值就是6.8亿英镑（合12.8亿美元）――如果英国机场管理局必须对乘客损失的时间进行赔偿的话，其利润将大打折扣。届时，英国机场管理局将迅速认识到，它可以雇佣更多的安检人员、购买更多的检测设备，来大幅减少旅客排队等候的时间，而花费只是赔偿成本的零头。
假如合同设计得好，英国机场管理局肯定将承担上述成本，那它就有了改善服务的相应动机。然而，在匆忙进行私有化的过程中，人们对这些细节给予的关注太少。如果没有适当的激励机制，私人经营者将需要自己承担增加人员及设备带来的成本，但从中得不到任何好处。一味追求利润最大化，结果导致过度的节约；英国机场管理局的利润增长了，但其代价是航空公司的利润和消费者的福利受损；整个社会陷入恶性循环。英国机场管理局这种对客户和用户的明显不屑，或许正是垄断者的通病。
各方就此辩论的核心，往往是两种互相对立的体制安排――政府所有与私有化。其实还有别的选择，例如实行公司化，由航空公司持有大量股权，同时继续由政府监督安全。作为所有者，航空公司不仅关注机场运营对其利润的直接影响，还会关注一些间接影响，比如客户因为不满意而选择其它交通工具。航空公司自己会关注安全问题――它们都知道安全事故对于空中旅行意味着什么。
在撒切尔夫人(Thatcher)执政的年代，这种对市场盲目而过于简单的信任或许还可理解；但在当今时代就不一样了。当前的这场危机，应该会让英国机场所有用户都已明白的一个问题变得毫无争议：某个地方出了错，必须对其进行纠正。合作形式的公司化是一种方法，但也有其它方法。人们对政府管理机场的抱怨在于，在平衡纳税人利益和用户利益方面，政府对用户承担的责任不够，它们过于关注为纳税人省钱，对用户的便利则关注太少。实行私有化之后，机场管理者将需要负起责任――但只是对股东负责。显然，除非辅以更好的激励机制，否则，私有化结果将继续令人失望。
本文作者曾获2001年诺贝尔(Nobel Prize)经济学奖，并曾担任克林顿政府的美国总统经济顾问委员会主席；其最新著作《让全球化发挥作用》(Making Globalisation Work)将于本月由WW Norton公司和企鹅出版社(Penguin)联合出版。
