cbo s scoring methodology is gimmicky and does not hold up to strict scrutiny as a serious policy initiative. and i thought grover was all about strict. but even though grover didn t like it, he didn t fight it. he did not call it a tax even though it is. he went along with republicans pretending it s a user fee. that is a fee collected on each airplane ticket simply to cover the costs of running the tsa budget and running those airlines with the tsa security in effect. the trouble with that and grover didn t mention this. the trouble with that is the money collected on these tickets doesn t go to the tsa budget. it goes into general revenue, the very same big pot that your income tax goes into. republicans voted for this, not
security agency, the bill, however, structures the tsa ticket fee not as a tax but as an offsetting receipt to pay for tsa services. in so doing, this fee straddles the line between a tax increase and a user fee without technically crossing into tax hike territory. the provision is scored by cbo as a spending cut in the form of an offsetting receipt and has been since tsa was first created by congress. this is a very bad way to write legislation. cbo s scoring methodology is gimmicky and does not hold up to strict scrutiny as a serious policy initiative. and i thought grover was all about strict. but even though grover didn t like it, he didn t fight it. he did not call it a tax even though it is. he went along with republicans pretending it s a user fee.