You make it sound like this was excess money. In fact it was cash flow freed up by leveraging the entire company and loading it up with debt, a ponzi game they

You make it sound like this was excess money. In fact it was cash flow freed up by leveraging the entire company and loading it up with debt, a ponzi game they were playing with the feds where the feds made the low interest loans happen and the airlines bought back stocks to bring about the desired market bull run. And the executives got paid, seeing how stock (and stock performance) is a big part of their renumeration.