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American Morning
Minding Your Business: Airport Security Forces Facing Cuts
Aired May 01, 2003 - 07:50 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: It seems no job is secure in this country these days, not even in airport security.
Andy Serwer is working nights. Gerri Willis is here in the morning "Minding Your Business today.
Good morning to you.
GERRI WILLIS, "SMARTMONEY" MAGAZINE: Good morning.
HEMMER: So they're going to cut back on airport screeners, which leads to the obvious question: What happens to security?
WILLIS: You bet. And it's not just a few. It's 3,000 on top of 3,000 screeners already let go earlier this year. That's 11 percent of the work force.
And now, experts in security at airports are saying, you know what? This could be a problem. They are saying that maybe other kinds of security should be put in place like these bomb-detection devices. But keep in mind that these screeners individually, they're only looking at about three people per hour, so it's not that many people.
We've got a list of the airports here that are being affected. Look at New York Kennedy here, 396 screeners are going to be let go.
And keep in mind that it's mostly about traffic, the level of traffic. One of the airports getting hit hard here is Salt Lake City. Remember, after 9/11, they had the Olympics, so they had to beef up. Now they're powering back down here.
We're looking at the markets this morning. We're going to...
HEMMER: Yes, Alan Greenspan was talking yesterday, and...
WILLIS: Yes.
HEMMER: ... he says he doesnt want the tax cuts, but I'm not sure if he filled in for the lawmakers all of their questions from yesterday.
WILLIS: Well, you know, it was a big ho-hum, a big shrugging of the shoulders, nothing happened in the markets today.
And you know, for this morning, we're looking at maybe a little lower on the open. But what people are really paying attention to here: jobless claims, initial jobless claims. This is key for the economy. People signing up for jobless claims for the first time, looking at maybe 400,000, a little bit over. That's really a tipping point. It says that the job market is contracting rather than expanding, and we'll be keeping an eye on that.
HEMMER: Good deal. Gerri, see you next hour.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com.
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Aired May 1, 2003 - 07:50 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: It seems no job is secure in this country these days, not even in airport security.
Andy Serwer is working nights. Gerri Willis is here in the morning "Minding Your Business today.
Good morning to you.
GERRI WILLIS, "SMARTMONEY" MAGAZINE: Good morning.
HEMMER: So they're going to cut back on airport screeners, which leads to the obvious question: What happens to security?
WILLIS: You bet. And it's not just a few. It's 3,000 on top of 3,000 screeners already let go earlier this year. That's 11 percent of the work force.
And now, experts in security at airports are saying, you know what? This could be a problem. They are saying that maybe other kinds of security should be put in place like these bomb-detection devices. But keep in mind that these screeners individually, they're only looking at about three people per hour, so it's not that many people.
We've got a list of the airports here that are being affected. Look at New York Kennedy here, 396 screeners are going to be let go.
And keep in mind that it's mostly about traffic, the level of traffic. One of the airports getting hit hard here is Salt Lake City. Remember, after 9/11, they had the Olympics, so they had to beef up. Now they're powering back down here.
We're looking at the markets this morning. We're going to...
HEMMER: Yes, Alan Greenspan was talking yesterday, and...
WILLIS: Yes.
HEMMER: ... he says he doesnt want the tax cuts, but I'm not sure if he filled in for the lawmakers all of their questions from yesterday.
WILLIS: Well, you know, it was a big ho-hum, a big shrugging of the shoulders, nothing happened in the markets today.
And you know, for this morning, we're looking at maybe a little lower on the open. But what people are really paying attention to here: jobless claims, initial jobless claims. This is key for the economy. People signing up for jobless claims for the first time, looking at maybe 400,000, a little bit over. That's really a tipping point. It says that the job market is contracting rather than expanding, and we'll be keeping an eye on that.
HEMMER: Good deal. Gerri, see you next hour.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com.
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