GAO Urges FAA To Set, Better Assess ATC Hiring Metrics

The FAA should establish measurable goals and more consistently assess its controller recruiting, hiring, and training processes, the Government Accountability Office asserted in a new report addressing persistent air traffic controller staffing challenges. In the U.S., controller staffing numbers are down, even as hiring rose, and GAO looked into what is causing the attrition amid rising traffic in the National Airspace System.

GAO concluded its report with three recommendations for action: that the FAA develop a system to allow applicants to efficiently access information about their application status and next steps; that the FAA “establish and document measurable goals for its processes to recruit, hire, and train air traffic controllers”; and that the FAA “use the information [it] collects across its databases to assess its processes for recruiting, hiring, and training air traffic controllers and inform decisions about any needed improvements.” 

The FAA faces ongoing staffing challenges amid rising demand for air traffic services. Controllers handle more than 80,000 flights daily in U.S. airspace, and perform work that requires specialized skills and training, but the agency has faced staffing shortages at critical facilities for more than a decade. GAO noted that lapses in appropriations during the 2010s and the Covid-19 pandemic reduced controller hiring and increased attrition, prompting the FAA to ramp up hiring beginning in 2021. Even so,

GAO found that at the end of Fiscal Year 2025, the FAA employed 13,164 controllers, “about 6% fewer than in 2015,” while total flights using the air traffic control system increased about 10% between fiscal years 2015 and 2024, to 30.8 million.

To evaluate the FAA’s response, GAO analyzed hiring and training data from application through certification, reviewed agency documentation, visited the FAA Academy and multiple facilities, interviewed FAA officials and industry stakeholders, and compared the FAA’s efforts with leading practices for evidence-based decision-making.

GAO found that the FAA has actually increased controller hiring each year since 2021, but staffing has not returned to earlier levels as demand rose, and staffing levels have actually decreased while pressure on the system rose. GAO attributed attrition in part to the length and complexity of the hiring pipeline, which it said can take two to six years from application to full certification. The report shone a spotlight on the medical clearance process as a major source of delay, noting that “In recent years, these evaluations have taken on average more than 2 years to process,” referring to further psychological evaluations associated with the medical clearance step.

Beyond these constraints, GAO reported that applicants and trainees described difficulties navigating the process and obtaining timely information. GAO wrote that “students that we spoke with said that is often challenging to determine their application status when applying for air traffic controller positions.” The report also found that applicants frequently must contact FAA staff directly for updates, adding workload to human resources personnel.

Hiring controllers is critical to aviation safety but the GAO acknowledged it remains a complex, lengthy, and resource-intensive process that has been further strained by external pressures over the past decade, including the pandemic. While the FAA has taken steps to improve recruitment and address attrition during the extended hiring and training pipeline, the GAO found that key weaknesses persist, particularly in applicant communication and performance management.

The report found that although FAA collects extensive data on applicants and trainees, it lacks specific plans to analyze that information to measure outcomes or identify where attrition occurs, limiting its ability to improve efficiency. Without measurable goals, GAO said, FAA cannot effectively decide where to invest resources to strengthen the process, a shortcoming that is especially significant as the agency works to “supercharge” hiring.