.@USTreasury Secretary @stevenmnuchin1 insistence that America’s major airlines partially repay taxpayer funds aimed at shoring up the industry has set up a clash between the Trump administration and the carriers bloomberg.com/news/articles/… via @bpolitics
If airline industry wants no payback to government, let them try their luck with other funders. If airline execs were not complaining, we could be sure the terms were too generous.
Airlines running of their business on a high leverage, low cash reserve basis was a strategic choice which for years worked great for their shareholders. Now it hasn’t. Too bad. Not a rationale for a bailout.
Supporting wages for flight attendants is important. But, no more so than train conductors, dental workers, store managers, or airport personnel. We need to and currently are not doing right by workers. But no rationale for a separate airline industry program.
Airlines as they sought to break Unions have demonstrated that they can smoothly go through bankruptcy hurting shareholders and creditors but providing service. Unlike some other industries, we know the bankruptcy mechanism works.
The truth is that the @stevenmnuchin1 deal which, as reported, requires repayment of only 1/3 of their grants is in fact corporate welfare - unless I am missing something.
This is not remotely necessary to keep planes flying or workers working when conditions make that possible.
It's hard to find less attractive candidates for public largesse than Big Air which has already benefited from soft anti-trust, given away gate slots, and various tax breaks.
