https://bitcoinmagazine.com/culture/bitcoin-songsheet-airline-miles?utm_source=Bitcoin+Magazine&utm_campaign=4e1027bcbe-&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_f7d45fbb67-4e1027bcbe-357073741&mc_cid=4e1027bcbe&mc_eid=386b7b0895

Bitcoin Songsheet: Airline Miles Are The Original Altcoins

• Airline miles are the original altcoin, allowing zombie companies to issue value for nothing while encouraging people to be “Miles Chasers.”

Jimmy Song
Apr 11, 2022

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Because governments view airlines as a display of national prestige, there’s a tendency to bail them out of their troubles. The three major U.S. airlines (Delta, American and United) have gone through at least one bankruptcy in the last 20 years. The bankruptcy proceedings usually result in a merger or some new company that’s injected with government funds. Even airlines that might go bankrupt are bailed out by the government such as during the travel shutdowns of the pandemic. The result is that airlines are now zombie companies that repeatedly get revived through government intervention.

Zombie companies typically don’t do that well in the marketplace. It’s no coincidence that air travel times are slower now than in the ‘70s. Planes might be more fuel efficient, but they’re not really faster or more convenient. The way these zombies have survived, besides government intervention, is through the financialization of their miles programs.

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One really has to see the link between bailouts and inefficient zombie companies.

Real competition between financially healthy airlines would make air travel faster, more convenient, as well as “cheaper”.

The DHS / TSA “airport security” is “security theater” at best and further allows zombie airlines to shift costs to the public at large.

Argh!

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