Wall Street Journal
By MATTHEW
KAMINSKI
Airline business: Mere oxymoron or investor death wish? Cumulatively,
America's airlines have lost $34 billion since 1947. In the last decade, five
legacy carriers landed in Chapter 11 bankruptcy—US Airways twice. "How do you
become a millionaire?" mused Warren Buffett, who had an unhappy dalliance with
US Airways. "Make a billion dollars and then buy an airline."
The commercial jet came of age in Seattle, yet when Bill Ayer quotes another
Buffettism at a business conference here—"If a farsighted capitalist had been
present at Kitty Hawk, he would have done his successors a huge favor by
shooting Orville down"—the audience erupts in laughter. Mr. Ayer knows his
gallows humor. He runs America's seventh-largest carrier, Alaska Airlines.
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