Judah writes:

Your statement is equivalent to saying that commercial land vehicles (cars
& trucks) are a necessity, but private ones are not.

No, it's not even remotely close to that.

The only difference is that fewer pilots fly privately than drivers
who drive privately.

That difference is huge: there are about 400 licensed drivers for every
licensed pilot, and while licensed drivers tend to drive fairly regularly,
licensed pilots do not (it's just too expensive, usually). In fact, private
pilots spend more time in a car driving to and from the airfield than they
spend in the air, in many cases.

Many people drive cars because they have to. They can't hold a job without a
car. It's hard to find any situations in which this is true for general
aviation and private pilots.

But what you don't recognize is that GA is necessary to maintain the
infastructure of the commercial airlines. For example, FBOs in many small
airports would not be able to support themselves or their employees without
the income produced from servicing and storing these private aircraft. At
my airport, the GA ramp has hundreds of planes each paying several hundred
dollars a month just for a tie down. They also provide fuel for these
aircraft, and have a crew that lays out the

They also handle service for a small number of GA fractional jet share
clients, and do overnight service and storing of a small number of Airline
jets. However, I doubt they could support their current structure just on
the fees associated with fueling up some NetJets and towing Dash-8's for
United to a hangar.

A lot of airports would simply disappear without GA, as they would no longer
serve any purpose. The airlines don't need them.

More importantly, though, without the GA system, there would be limited
opportunities for people to build the required experience to become a safe
commercial aviator. There would probably also be a reduced lack of
interest.

Commercial aviators can be trained from scratch in simulators; small aircraft
are only used because current regulations require it, but regulations can be
changed.

So perhaps you have not observed the full extent of the picture, and have
made a judgement based on incomplete or innacurate theories...

No, I've seen the picture objectively, and not through the rose-colored
goggles worn by many pilots. The fact is, general aviation by private pilots
could disappear in a puff of smoke tomorrow, and it would have no effect at
all on society at large.

It's important to keep this in mind when trying to influence or shape public
policy with respect to GA. The vast majority of the population cares nothing
about your flying, and would not miss it if it were gone; so if you want to
persuade that population, you need a method that doesn't depend on the
subjective appeal of flying an aircraft (which doesn't exist for most people).
Indeed, if you concentrate too much on this aspect, you may alienate the
majority, and you definitely don't want to do that.

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