U.S. Customs Service User Fees: A Variety of Charges and Counter-Charges

User charges, which have become an important revenue enhancement device during the 1980s, have also raised a variety of counter-charges. This study examines three new mandatory Customs Service fees—for processing passengers, conveyances, and merchandise entering the United States and for special services at small airports—along with their differences and changes over time (in rate structure, exemptions, dedicated accounts, and disposition of funds). Despite support for the charges, opposition to some has arisen because of their cost to the private sector, violation of certain assumptions behind user fees, competing international obligations and policies, rival institutional interests and powers of Congress and the presidency, and changing fiscal conditions.