{"id":48388,"date":"2026-03-28T18:41:11","date_gmt":"2026-03-28T18:41:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/agooka.com\/news\/usa\/tsa-workers-are-getting-paid-again-but-airport-chaos-isnt-going-anywhere\/"},"modified":"2026-03-28T18:41:11","modified_gmt":"2026-03-28T18:41:11","slug":"tsa-workers-are-getting-paid-again-but-airport-chaos-isnt-going-anywhere","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/agooka.com\/news\/usa\/tsa-workers-are-getting-paid-again-but-airport-chaos-isnt-going-anywhere\/","title":{"rendered":"TSA workers are getting paid again, but airport chaos isn&#8217;t going anywhere"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/i.insider.com\/69c68bed445048b5f68bb9a8?format=jpeg\" alt=\"People waiting in TSA Line at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport.\"\/><figcaption>Travelers at US airports are experiencing long wait times at TSA checkpoints.<\/p>\n<p>Bloomberg\/Contributor\/Getty Images<\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<ul>\n<li>President Donald Trump ordered Homeland Security to reinstate pay for TSA officers on Friday.<\/li>\n<li>It doesn&#039;t mean lines will get shorter \u2014 or tickets cheaper \u2014 anytime soon.<\/li>\n<li>Airlines are navigating a confluence of storms, like staffing shortages and rising jet fuel costs.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Jetsetting has gotten less glamorous \u2014 and that&#039;s not expected to change even as President Donald Trump reinstates pay for Transportation Security Administration workers.<\/p>\n<p>Trump on Friday directed Homeland Security to start paying TSA workers after Congress failed to agree on a path to end the partial government shutdown and fund the Department of Homeland Security.<\/p>\n<p>The DHS said its agents could start seeing paychecks again as soon as Monday, but if you thought that would mean shorter airport security lines, you might want to pack a snack.<\/p>\n<p>The airline industry is facing an assembly of problems \u2014 war, rising costs, staffing shortages, to name a few \u2014 that are making flying more expensive and stressful.<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Staffing Shortages<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>The funding lapse had forced TSA officers, who make a starting salary of about $40,000 and often live paycheck to paycheck, to go without wages for weeks. Hundreds of them quit.<\/p>\n<p>Even with the promise of full paychecks to come soon, the TSA will need to address this staffing shortfall.<\/p>\n<p>Ha Nguyen McNeill, the agency&#039;s deputy administrator, said almost 500 officers have quit since the partial shutdown began in mid-February. More than 1,000 TSA agents also quit during the 43-day government shutdown late last year.<\/p>\n<p>The TSA employs about 50,000 officers, but it takes 4 to 6 months to complete training. That means those long lines might linger a while longer. It&#039;s possible those open roles may not be filled in time for the FIFA World Cup in June.<\/p>\n<p>&quot;This is a dire situation,&quot; McNeill told lawmakers on Wednesday. &quot;We are facing a potential perfect storm of severe staffing shortages and an influx of millions of passengers at our airports.&quot;<\/p>\n<p>Adam Stahl, the TSA chief of staff, also addressed staffing lapses on Wednesday. He said the situation will &quot;get worse before it gets better&quot; despite Trump&#039;s executive order.<\/p>\n<p>&quot;There are knock-on ramifications of attrition when the shutdown ends,&quot; Stahl told &quot;The Hill,&quot; a TV news program on NewsNation.<\/p>\n<p>He added that the recruiting pipeline is a &quot;challenge.&quot;<\/p>\n<p>&quot;Folks that are possibly in the pipeline or they&#039;re considering going and joining the workforce will be dissuaded because of the lack of job security,&quot; Stahl said.<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Flying is getting pricier<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>Jet fuel costs are skyrocketing due to the US and Israel&#039;s war on Iran, which is expected to add to the already elevated cost of flying.<\/p>\n<p>Prices have surged to about nearly $200 a barrel since February, far surpassing the earlier $100 average.<\/p>\n<p>As a result, some airlines are relying on consumers to cover the additional costs. Qantas Airways, Air India, Thai Air, and other airlines have already alerted flyers that they&#039;re raising ticket prices.<\/p>\n<p>The ongoing military conflict has effectively shut down the Strait of Hormuz, a waterway near Iran&#039;s coast through which 20% of the world&#039;s oil supply and liquefied natural gas typically pass. Other major oil hubs, including a key port in the United Arab Emirates, have sustained damage.<\/p>\n<p>The war has also forced some countries to close their airspace, forcing airlines to reroute flights and find alternative routes.<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Mounting anxiety<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>None of this is good for the airline industry.Some Americans are increasingly anxious about air travel, which could make them think twice about purchasing costly tickets.<\/p>\n<p>In an Ipsos survey conducted in February, almost half of respondents said they&#039;re &quot;losing confidence in the safety of air travel.&quot; Respondents with household incomes over $125,000 had even less confidence.<\/p>\n<p>&quot;That&#039;s likely a worrying stat for the travel industry as the high earners are much more frequent fliers,&quot; the global market research firm wrote in its report.<\/p>\n<p>Less than 30% of respondents said they felt &quot;confident in the safety of air travel.&quot;<\/p>\n<p>The survey doesn&#039;t specify a reason. However, there could be several factors, including the war&#039;s impact on international travel, rising ticket prices during a time of economic anxiety, the fallout from staff shortages, or a string of recent emergencies.<\/p>\n<p>In January, a passenger jet collided with a Black Hawk helicopter near the Reagan Washington National Airport. Sixty-seven people died. And this week, an Air Canada passenger plane crashed into a fire truck, killing two pilots.<\/p>\n<p>Read the original article on Business Insider<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Travelers at US airports are experiencing long wait times at TSA checkpoints. Bloomberg\/Contributor\/Getty Images President Donald Trump ordered Homeland Security to reinstate pay for TSA officers on Friday. It doesn&#039;t mean lines will get shorter \u2014 or tickets cheaper \u2014 anytime soon. Airlines are navigating a confluence of storms, like staffing shortages and rising jet [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":48389,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-48388","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-usa"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/agooka.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48388","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/agooka.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/agooka.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/agooka.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/agooka.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=48388"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/agooka.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48388\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/agooka.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/48389"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/agooka.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=48388"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/agooka.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=48388"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/agooka.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=48388"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}