Originally Posted by alfaromeo

Not that there is anything that can be done to change it now, but if you look at the four airlines that went into bankruptcy around the same time, United and US Air did not do concessions before and Delta and Northwest did. Delta ended up with the best work rules, the highest pay rates, and the best bankruptcy returns. Northwest alone retained their defined benefit plan.

We can't go back and run an experiment, but you can't say that airlines that waited until bankruptcy did better than those that took concessions before. In fact, the opposite is true.