Greg Rosalsky

Didn't see that one.

Love a good pun in the headline.

Yeah, so this is all pretty incredible, right?

I mean, the federal government is now basically flirting with the idea of getting into the airline business and maybe taking like an ownership stake in it.

I mean, the Trump administration did do something similar with U.S.

Steel last year.

And yeah, they could maybe sell the stake later and maybe make a profit and this will all work.

But still, like this is not the typical way that like U.S.

capitalism works.

And as of now, the bailout idea kind of stands like this.

Spirit has said it wants a bailout.

Last week, President Trump suggested he might be open to it at the right price.

More recently, the Transportation Secretary suggested he thinks that Congress would have to get involved.

Yeah.

That's right.

You could call it the revenge of the legacy carriers.

Okay, so the legacy airlines, they look at Spirit and other budget airlines, and clearly they're eating their lunch.

They're charging lower ticket prices up front, and that seems to be working.

So Delta and American and United, they also start throwing creature comforts out the window for passengers not willing to pay for them.

And this way they could also charge a lower upfront ticket price and compete for budget travelers.