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Comment by lostlogin | Hacker News Reader

Company, always: "We need government subsidy". Then hell yes to regulating what they do.

Spirit wasn't asking for a government subsidy to get saved from bakruptcy. They were asking to be allowed to get merged with JetBlue (which could've saved them from bankruptcy) and got denied by the government. Those two things aren't the same.

My understanding is that the Spirit/JetBlue merger was blocked by the Biden DOJ. Were they asking for that again, or was it a different thing that failed in negotiations with the feds recently?

The negotiations that were occuring directly prior to Spirit's shutdown were not merger related; but a direct government bailout.

Biden/Warren backed/forced the DOJ to sue Jetblue/Spirit to block the merger for antitrust.

This doesn't seem to be a antitrust issue at all, it looks like it was one company bailing out another.

https://www.justice.gov/archives/opa/pr/justice-department-s...

“Our win in court is a victory for U.S. travelers who deserve lower prices and better choices,” said Assistant Attorney General Jonathan Kanter of the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division. “We fought this case to protect consumers who, as the court recognized, ‘otherwise would have no voice.’ I am incredibly proud of the Antitrust Division’s team and our state law enforcement partners’ tireless advocacy.”

Two wrongs don't make a right.

I know it’s frowned upon many circles, but regulation can work and do good.

There is plenty of crap legislation and regulation about, but it doesn’t have to be that way.

Yes, but be careful not to commit the 'nirvana fallacy' of comparing real world circumstances against idealised optimal regulation.

Sure, that's fair. But often enough I see people (not accusing you of this) doing the opposite: seeing bad regulation, and drawing the conclusion that the only solution is to remove all regulation and "let the market decide".

Have you ever tried to get rid of bad regulation? I have, and it is essentially impossible. De-regulation is usually the only path once the initial regulation is in place. It also only ever seems to grow in complexity and onerousness, rarely ever goes the other directin. It's like dealing with a massive legacy codebase that also has the power to throw you in jail.

I'm not against regulation, I think there are areas where it's needed (privacy is a good example), but it is fire, and fire should only be played with when you really need it because it can easily grow out of control and burn things you don't intend to get burned.

Have you ever tried to regulate an unregulated industry preying upon a population?

Look what it took to wrangle the cigarette industry. Look how unfettered gambling is ripping through the USA.

Or look at industries pre-regulation. Meat, building construction, medicine...

At minimum we have as much evidence that "the market" is capable of being as bad as "bad regulation."

Gambling might be ripping though the US, maybe. But it's far from unfettered.

> Or look at industries pre-regulation. Meat, building construction, medicine...

You might like to read about what economists call 'Normal Goods': https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Normal_good

> In economics, a normal good is a type of a good for which consumers increase their demand due to an increase in income, unlike inferior goods, for which the opposite is observed. When there is an increase in a person's income, for example due to a wage rise, a good for which the demand rises due to the wage increase, is referred as a normal good. Conversely, the demand for normal goods declines when the income decreases, for example due to a wage decrease or layoffs.

Health and safety are normal goods. As people get richer, they demand more of them.

That's far too cynical. A normal good is caviar, or wine. Health and safety are human rights. Not everything should be commoditized.

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