[ben509]

This is a natural disaster, businesses shuttered before the government did anything because many people wisely started to quarantine themselves. So to be fair to the government, a lot of shutting down was happening anyway.

Being a natural disaster, I think the fairest characterization of the money is a relief effort, just as if a hurricane had struck.

A bailout is a fair term if the market screws up, as in the 2007 financial crisis due to subprime mortgages. Though the causes were complex, people were selling dodgy financial products that obscured value and risk.

In this case, many companies are adapting to a big shock quite well because of automation and delivery, but there are a ton of businesses that closed because they have a face to face business model.

[TuringNYC]

I cant speak about AirBnB, but the reason bailouts are unpopular with some companies...say...airline companies is because they purposely implemented stock buy-backs and wasted most their reserve cash chasing EPS. Now they come for money. How is that fair to other companies which remained cautious and maintained cash reserves?

[thu2111]

Are you saying every airline should have held cash reserves (really more likely to be bonds or other investments) sufficient to sustain them through a total wipeout of their entire customer base for months on end? A scenario that has never happened before in the history of commercial aviation?

Resources tied up in cash buffers are resources not deployed elsewhere, after all.