> That said, it makes sense that if you pull the emergency lever and request a state bailout, you should pay future dividends back to the state for at least a d

> That said, it makes sense that if you pull the emergency lever and request a state bailout, you should pay future dividends back to the state for at least a decent amount of time since they basically gave you a loan that no-one else would. This sounds like it should be a similar mechanism as startups' liquidation preference schemes. Investors that provided capital when others wouldn't are in a position to request that they get paid back in priority. For startups, it's (usually) if it fails. For mature companies, it could be a tweaked form like dividend priority or payback priority. Basically a mechanism to balance out the risk.