There are many reasons to consider aviation as a viable alternative to a company’s usual travel process. The business aircraft is like a time machine, and when used correctly, can add tangible value to a company’s bottom line. When companies get their personnel cut back to a barely functional level, there will be a push to do “more-more-more, with less-less-less!” When that happens, folks will need to travel as quickly as possible to accomplish that mission. Face-to-face meetings to hammer out contracts will take place. Trouble shooters will ride in to save the day. Rural communities will be thankful for the municipal airport in their backyard that was one of the many factors drawing in a new manufacturing facility, providing jobs and tax base and increased quality of life.

Business aviation is indeed vital to our nation. It provides high-tech manufacturing and research jobs nationwide. The airplanes and other equipment produced in business aviation manufacturing are delivered world wide, thus offsetting international trade deficits.

Our transportation services provide great savings of time for high value employees, thus maximizing their productivity. We also provide for the security of those same employees and the proprietary knowledge they hold.

Unfortunately, some in the media and politics use emotional tactics when trying to make a rational argument. All that does is incite irrational behavior. Without knowing the facts specific to the Motorola issue, it’s hard for anyone to do more than speculate about the reasoning behind the acquisition, ownership and use of their business aircraft. To do more would be foolish.

Typically, aircraft of this nature used by high-tech, multi-national companies are used to move high-value personnel and clients from place to place as efficiently as possible. There are many tangible and intangible reasons for doing so. Historically, companies would compete for the best and brightest with financial packages that include various benefits; personal use of a company’s resources is one of the tools they use. Yes, the value of that benefit is charged out as income and taxes are paid on its value. So, now we’re back to using the company car, or not . . .

I don’t have all the answers, but I sure am tired of a legitimate industry taking it on the chin because the media needs to score some advertising points and a politician needs some air time.

Ms. Leder, I would encourage you to dig a little and find some of the many positive stories out there about business aviation, rather that roll around in the mud with the rest of the media.

But it’s hard to call it anything but a handout when a company allows its executives to use the corporate jet as their personal taxi for things like commuting or weekend trips. And, speaking of hand-outs, what would you call the tax gross-ups that many companies provide top executives to “make them whole” for their personal use? Thankfully, many companies have begun to rethink their policies on gross-ups. But there are still plenty of companies that provide them, judging from the recent crop of filings.

Finally, your comment that “Do you really think a company would invest in a jet if it wouldn’t make them money” shows that you’re more interested in political rants — something we try to avoid here on the site — as opposed to discussing the issue in a rational way that shows you understand the basic fundamentals of corporate finance. The bottom line is that corporate jets can be incredibly beneficial and that they do provide jobs to the people who make and service them. But that doesn’t mean they’re always used in a way that enhances shareholder value, which, last time I checked, was a basic tenet of free markets.