Why People Are Mad at the Airline Bailout

Would people be as mad if the airlines had paid dividends (like utilities or many established non-growth companies)? I (not a financial expert) looked at their 10-Ks, and it looked like they are prohibited from paying dividends because of their loan agreements.

And yeah, they did borrow money for capex like buying airplanes and maintenance facilities, but they also operate at like a 10% profit margin. With low interest rates that seems kind of reasonable?

I get that using taxpayer money to maintain airlines is unfair, but the bailout (grant) money is contingent upon the airlines maintaining flight routes that they would otherwise shutdown (non-hub airport). The Sec. of Transportation is saying that those routes are critical infrastructure to be able to ship supplies to those places. (Ok she works for Trump, and has worked for Bush & Regan and is married to Mitch McConnell, not sure if that's relevant). But prima facie I don't see what's wrong with saying small towns should have access to medical equipment now, nor for the government paying for it.

The bailout loan money I don't think they really need. Delta and United were both able to borrow $2B each from the banks, and they have plenty of airplanes to use as collateral for more loans. But the bailout loan money is also contingent upon the airlines not having any other access to capital.

I'm just saying the airlines now do not look like the banks did in 2008. They were all profitable from basic operations (flying passengers), and were not over-leveraged in speculative deals (they borrowed to buy airplanes). Delta and United each ended 2019 with over $4.5B cash, and over $2B of easily accessible credit. Their operating costs are like $3.5B/month, and that's running at full capacity w/ no oil war. I'm not a businessperson, but I wouldn't really expect most of my local restaurants (or individuals!) to have enough cash to last two months with zero income.

Anyways, that's all based on looking at their SEC filings. Full disclosure I bought some shares (also is there some moral argument against business owners taking profit from their earnings?), but that also means I'd be really interested if anyone has a good counter-argument.