As stated by the President of the Experimental Aircraft Association, an upgrade of the US ATC should be done carefully and piece by piece. The reason: the system works acceptably at most locations. Immediate upgrade is needed at Newark, NJ. ATC in Philadelphia needs to be split to include ATC in Newark.
The ATC system would function better with more ATC controllers and higher paid controllers. Making a non people non controller ATC system is simply not warranted; at this time or for the foreseeable future. More problems exist with the airlines than with ATC. Specifically, the airlines do not keep back ups of their electronic systems and probably need two electronic system back ups of everything. And TSA can always use improvement. So the focus or order of needed priority could be better at the FAA.