AVIATION: Cheaper than Potatoes

How much does it cost U.S. taxpayers to subsidize U.S. airlines? Nobody knows for sure, but last week Joseph J. O'Connell Jr., chairman of CAB, told the New York City Bar Association that CAB soon hopes to find out. CAB expects to break down the Government payments to airlines into outright subsidies and the amount airlines have earned carrying the mail.

Last year, said Joe O'Connell, the Post Office paid the airlines $94 million in mail pay; in 1949 the bill might run to $125 million. This, he conceded, "is not small change by any means. On the other hand,...

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