That was supposedly a common question during the Great Depression of the 1930s, together with the presence of hobos, bindlestiffs, and other “knights of the road.”

Today, according to some postings on social media, we have this:

(AI-generated cartoon, using Copilot)

From the Rapid City Regional Airport in the Black Hills of South Dakota, we have a “NextDoor” posting. We are reminded that (courtesy of Congressional wrangling and other factors), DHS has not been funded. So your friendly airport trolls in TSA get-up are not getting paid. So, the poster tells us, travelers in and out of the airport are asked to drop a few dimes (or dollars) into tip baskets to give a little help to the unpaid TSA agents for pawing through your luggage, your carry-on, powering up your laptop, making you take your belt buckle and shoes off, and wanding you so that you can fly to visit Aunt Ginnie in Seattle or Houston.

Right.

TSA agents, like most FedGov employees, have chosen to take the “security” of a government paycheck over the benefits of freedom as an employee of a business or even a business owner. With all the risks of getting laid off, not breaking even, or not getting paid because business is bad or bankruptcy happens.

Only to find out that there isn’t as much security in a guvmint job as they hoped.

They no doubt had their reasons, and their reasons may have been good and important. But we here at TPOL admit that sometimes it is as hard to be as sympathetic as perhaps we should be. (We know, we’ve been in such situations before.)

But when we were, we committed the same sin: putting our trust in princes. (Don’t think senators and congresscritters aren’t “princes” and “princesses” today? Look at their paycheck, benefits, and increase in net worth over just a term or two.)

At the same time as we struggle for sympathy for the TSA people, we are reminded that many Americans depend on tip jars for some or all of their income.

One very common and long-practiced tradition of tips is also related to the FedGov. In military commissaries, the soldiers and their families have two options when going through the checkout counter with their groceries. They can bag them themselves and get them out to their POV (privately-owned vehicles). Or they can have a “bagger” do it for them.

Baggers are usually themselves military family members (teenage dependents or spouses) who are paid only by tips from the commissary patrons. The patrons know this, and pay based on the speed and quality of the bagger’s work in getting everything into bags, back in the cart, and out to the parking lot, and safely loaded into the POV. Traditionally (though it varies from post to post and base to base) the money isn’t put into a tip jar but handed directly to the guy or gal, with an appreciative thank you by the customer. As you can imagine, baggers are courteous and attentive to commissary patrons.

It has worked for a century, or nearly that.

Gee. Maybe that is a pattern that might be followed. Thanks to the stupidity of Congress and fearmongering, we are stuck with the security forces that infest our airports, that cost millions in lost time and delays, and more. Would it be possible to have them work for tips from the very people that they are required by federal law to molest? Nah, probably not.

But it is still a neat cartoon!