Get Comfy in Coach

Brian Friel of Government Executive offers his views on OMB's Jan. 8 memo restricting federal premium travel.  Our previous post has links to the memo and related documents. Friel's bottom line:

A year earlier, GAO noted that the State Department, as well as other agencies, treats first-class travel as a morale-boosting perk. "The tone set by top State Department executives indicate that it treats premium-class as an employee benefit regardless of cost and federal law and regulation," GAO reported in September 2006. GAO's latest report called that approach into question across government.

Now, the jig is up. Human resources officials could come up with lots of reasons that executives and managers benefit from traveling in the front of the plane. But it doesn't matter. In this case, Congress and the White House don't want government to be more like business.