If studies alone could reform the Federal Aviation Administration, that agency should be a model of efficiency. In just the past four years, three commissions have published reports calling for an overhaul of the antiquated agency, and yet another commission is in the midst of studying it yet again. Two of those studies were under the auspices of Vice President Al Gore.

• All the studies agree the FAA needs updating -- particularly its aging air traffic control system whose machines are decades old and often break down.

• Although the FAA has spent the last 15 years trying to modernize it, the upgrade is still far from complete and the effort will cost taxpayers $34 billion through 2003 -- $11 billion of which will be spent between 1998 and 2003.

• Some 63 percent of the agency's $8.5 billion budget in fiscal 1997 will come from a trust fund and 80 percent of that will come from the $2.7 billion tax on airline tickets which has just been reinstated after expiring on January 1.

Critics cite several complaints they have with the way the FAA is operated.

• Although 20 percent of the air traffic system is used by general aviation, the industry pays only a fraction of that amount -- the rest being, in effect, a subsidy.

• The current system also subsidizes small, rural airports -- which could not pay their way if the FAA were forced to rely more heavily on user fees, as has been suggested.

• Economists say that if consumers were more aware of the costs they are paying to maintain the agency -- which are mostly hidden in ticket prices -- they would demand changes.

Analysts warn that the FAA's present adequate safety record will not last unless Congress upgrades the agency, its equipment and management.

Source: Jeff A. Taylor, "Higher Taxes, Less Safe Skies," Investor's Business Daily, March 31, 1997.