Did they? Airline stock prices have collapsed, so unless insiders sold everything in January, "enrich themselves" really means standard executive pay...which might be high, but that's another issue. Airlines, as businesses, didn't behave especially irresponsibly for the past decade. It's nothing like the banking excesses in 2007 that causes 2008.
Air travel in the US was significantly more expensive when it was heavily regulated. By your logic, you very quickly get to a Chinese level of state ownership of businesses. Practically every large cap company would be on that list.
Does your discounted unregulated fare rate include the cost of the all the bailouts over the decades? Are you fine with letting the airlines fail this time?
It's not. It shouldn't be "another issue" every single time we discuss a company having financial trouble, just because it's widespread.
> By your logic, you very quickly get to a Chinese level of state ownership of businesses. Practically every large cap company would be on that list.
Not really. Any company that's not a natural monopoly can go ahead and go bankrupt. Utilities and transit would be on the list. Banks could be on or off the list depending on how you handle them. Not much else would be on the list.