BLUF
Are there any members of the Biden administration who aren’t hapless whiners and don’t think their agencies aren’t simply there to serve personal needs? I have yet to identify one.
Buttigieg is just more hapless and whinier than most.

Pete Buttigieg’s Plan to End Air Travel Armageddon: Force Airlines to Hire Workers
Perhaps it would have helped if the Biden administration didn’t force airlines to fire workers who didn’t follow its vaccine mandate.

I am so old that I remember the Biden administration vaccine mandates for companies with over 100 employees, potentially leading to travel disruptions for at least one airline late last year.

The disruptions continue, describing the situation as “travel Armageddon weekend.”

Travel issues continued piling up for fliers on Sunday as weekend flight delays and cancellations topped 10,000 — a tumultuous weekend for holiday travel blamed on staffing shortages, packed planes and the ripple effects from previous bad weather.

On Sunday alone, more than 4,200 U.S. flights were delayed and nearly 900 were canceled, as of 7 p.m. ET, according to FlightAware, which tracks flights in real time.

The Sunday flight problems continue a slew of weekend cancellations and delays throughout the country. Since Thursday, roughly over 19,000 flights have been canceled or delayed.

“This has been another travel Armageddon weekend,” James Ferrara, co-founder and president of global host travel agency InteleTravel, told USA TODAY. “But it’s not isolated, or really a surprise.”

To solve this problem, Department of Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg took a break from paternity leave to propose a solution after being inconvenienced.

Instead of forcing companies to fire workers, the federal government may force airlines to hire workers.

The federal government could take action against U.S. airlines on behalf of customers, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said Saturday.

Many Americans have endured delays, cancelations, and other travel complications during the coronavirus pandemic, and in recent months, after many pandemic-related travel restrictions were lifted.

Following Buttigieg’s own flight being canceled, forcing him to drive from Washington to New York, he said his department has authority to enforce action against airlines that do not sufficiently maintain consumer-protection standards, potentially requiring them to hire more staff.

Buttigieg is also instructing the airlines how to operate, in addition to threatening enforcement action.

Buttigieg said he is pushing the airlines to stress-test their summer schedules to ensure they can operate all their planned flights with the employees they have, and to add customer-service workers. That could put pressure on airlines to make additional cuts in their summer schedules.

Buttigieg said his department could take enforcement actions against airlines that fail to live up to consumer-protection standards. But first, he said, he wants to see whether there are major flight disruptions over the July Fourth holiday weekend and the rest of the summer.

Enforcement actions can results in fines, although they tend to be small. Air Canada agreed to pay a $2 million fine last year over slow refunds.

Americans are less than impressed by this idea, and see potential problems with the plan.

 

 

 

Are there any members of the Biden administration who aren’t hapless whiners and don’t think their agencies aren’t simply there to serve personal needs? I have yet to identify one.

Buttigieg is just more hapless and whinier than most.