There are many private ATC facilities currently in the US.
This is true, but they are all low-level tower facilities. I don't know the stats, but I'm guessing an overwhelming majority are only VFR towers too. People like to talk about how much money the "Contract Tower" program saves every year. The funny thing to me about these comments is that the people making them are often completely ignorant of the fact that the companies which operate federal contract towers (FCTs) do not train controllers from zero experience to certified professional controllers.
Midwest ATC states, "We offer rewarding positions for qualified air traffic controllers...", while Serco specifically mentions the requirement of a Certified Tower Operator (CTO) certificate as part of the application process. These companies are not taking people interested in BECOMING air traffic control specialists and dealing with the subsequent percentage of applicants who are unable to perform to the required levels of proficiency and safety.
No, they hire individuals with operational experience as air traffic control specialists and train them for the facility they will be working in, just like an FAA controller transferring from one facility to another. Where's the cost savings? Simple, I forgot to mention the controllers the contract companies hire work with less staffing, increased job responsibilities, and for less compensation. These companies also do not maintain most of the equipment required to provide the air traffic services which they advertise as their product. I bet I could reduce the cost of providing a community with fire protection too if I could hire previously successful firefighters and have the community provide my employees with all the equipment required to perform their function.
The Canadian system is a not-for-profit private system that by all visible measures appears to be working well, and may be worth examining as one example of a "privatized" system.
The Nav Canada comparison is not apples to apples. I'm going to work off old numbers here, but as of 9-15-2015 the FAA had just over 14,000 controllers on their books. The best I could do for finding a Nav Canada number was the 2015 Canadian Business Magazine's list of best jobs, which estimated the number of controllers at 5,100. Nav Canada operates 7 "Area Control Centers" which are the equivalent to the 21 "Air Route Traffic Control Centers" or "Centers" the FAA operates in the US. Not to mention the 24 stand alone "Terminal Radar Approach Control" facilities and numerous combined Tower/TRACON facilities throughout the country. As far as the number of airports and airport control towers each entity is responsible for ... Nav Canada's 41 versus FAA's 260 (half of which are combined Tower/TRACON facilities). I think I have made my point.
The statements comparing Nav Canada's success to the obvious success of a US system structured similarly are less a statement of fact and more a statement of belief that Nav Canada's system could be scaled larger. However, IMO, larger systems are inevitably less efficient than their smaller counterparts. Look at how small companies change as they grow into larger companies. Consider also that Nav Canada purchased all of the infrastructure from the Canadian Government. How could any entity be expected to purchase all the infrastructure that represents the National Airspace System in the US? And if they don't, then you are creating another instance where the government is not necessarily saving money. They are still paying to maintain and improve the infrastructure ... except now they are also paying someone else to manage the day-to-day operations utilizing that infrastructure.
In their view, its not American airspace, its American airlines' airspace. Expect everybody to pay more, except airlines, and witness the decline of GA.
Exactly. The bottom line is the airline industry's bottom line. When they control the board of directors for a US ATC corporation is when safety will become secondary. I do not care what line they feed the
PR machine, the fact will remain that the airlines will want to see every conceivable change to the system that will benefit their economic positions. Could it reduce the bureaucracy required to make improvements in technology and facilities? Sure. Could it facilitate better hiring/training/retention in the career field. Perhaps, though I'm less hopeful in that regard. I do not believe as some of my colleagues do, that a US ATC corporation would suddenly result in higher pay and better benefits for controllers. Quite frankly, that just isn't American. Regardless of profit versus non-profit, American culture is not to hand out better pay and benefits. It is much more about getting the most for as little as possible ... and I believe that would be the mindset of a board of directors. Particularly a board of directors with a vested interest in reducing the cost of the provision of ATC services to their companies.
I can not even begin to touch on the impact to Corporate and/or General Aviation, expect to say that there is a reason why so many pilots come to the US for their primary flight training. General Aviation is next to non-existent in countries with privatized ATC and the resulting user fees. You think American or United want to follow that slow C510 on final at O'Hare? Nope. You think UPS or FEDEX like all those TCAS events they get going in and out of smaller feeder airports where there are numerous small aircraft involved in flight training with inexperienced pilots while they are trying to deliver their freight? Absolutely not. You honestly think the airlines would not try to change the level of service provided to non-airline users? You are incredibly naive if you think they would prefer the status quo.