[sm0ss117]

This gets to one of the fundamental limits of for profit operation of businesses, different scales of firm have different incentives. For American Airlines it made logical sense to do stock buybacks, but if the whole of society was in control of American Airlines they would've prioritized service and just paid to keep the operation on life support during the downturn.

[jcranmer]

Given the way that public transit is run, I think service would be the lowest priority of an airline if it were run by society instead of capitalists.

[sm0ss117]

Try public transit in literally any country besides the US, the US is currently terrible at public utilities for ideological reasons. Basically the line of thinking is the government doesn't work, so let us in power to prove it to you