The flight of middle-class luxuries

It’s easy to forget that the war with Iran was supposed to be a cinch. To say that it has not worked out that way would be an understatement. While most headlines are focused on the damage to America’s military and economic credibility, there is another big loser: the airline industry. Indeed, the war has already claimed its first casualty in this field: the US budget airline Spirit, which went bankrupt at the start of the conflict. It’s true that Spirit had been plagued with problems for a long time and wasn’t exactly a healthy company, so the massive increase in fuel costs was only the final nail in the coffin. Then again, most airline companies aren’t very healthy. During the Covid pandemic, much of the global airline industry had to be bailed out by national governments in order to avo