Was the Southwest Airlines Meltdown Impacted By the “Great Share-Buyback Scam”?

Thom Hartmann
11 min readDec 30, 2022

It’s time to declare the 42-year Reagan Revolution’s neoliberal experiment a failure, and outlaw the stock manipulation that makes CEOs rich and impoverishes the rest of us

Image by ThePixelman from Pixabay

My radio/TV program and my daily Substack newsletter, Hartmann Report, together are a small business. The only way I can increase my income from that business is by increasing the advertising revenue to the show, getting more people signed up for the newsletter, or both.

Build the business, in other words. Do the hard work every day. Keep my “customers” informed and thus happy: add value through research and share what I learn along the way.

It used to be that way with big business as well — companies grew in value because of good management and continual reinvestment in people, facilities, and product — until Ronald Reagan adopted neoliberalism and rewrote the rules of business.

Southwest Airlines passengers, for example, are today lamenting lost time with loved ones, lost luggage, and lost money spent on hotels, airline reroutes, and rental cars.

They missed weddings and funerals, spending time with family, and some…

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Thom Hartmann

America’s #1 progressive talk show host & NY Times bestselling author. Thom’s writings also appear at HartmannReport.com.