The American ProspectMay 12, 20261 min read

Organized Money: Who Killed Spirit Airlines?

The article frames Spirit Airlines' failure through a left-leaning regulatory and anti-monopoly lens, centering the American Economic Liberties Project and consumer advocacy perspectives while using charged language ('oligopoly,' 'deregulation project,' 'killers working in concert'). The framing actively rebuts 'popular narratives you might hear on CNBC'—positioning mainstream business media as misleading—and emphasizes systemic failures over market forces, with implicit criticism of Trump and invocation of Biden's DOJ.

Primary voices: academic or expert, media outlet, NGO or civil society

This article does not address labor cost pressures or wage-related operational challenges specific to Spirit Airlines.
This article does not provide counterarguments from airline industry representatives, economists favoring deregulation, or those skeptical of increased antitrust enforcement.

Framing may shift as regulatory investigations into airline industry consolidation continue and as outcomes of potential antitrust actions become clearer.

Think-tank-citedAnti-interventionistReform-oriented

A Spirit Airlines plane is departing from an airport. It is the signature yellow plane but looks hazy in the sky. — Credit: Reginald Mathalone/NurPhoto via AP Photo

Spirit Airlines is dead, and everyone is pointing fingers: Was it the war in Iran that killed Spirit? Joe Biden’s Justice Department? Antitrust regulation? Jet fuel? Lina Khan?! Today on the show, we demystify Spirit’s demise with William J. McGee, senior fellow for aviation and travel at the American Economic Liberties Project.

McGee is a longtime consumer advocate in the air travel space and has watched as the deregulation project, which began in the 1970s, has slowly whittled down competition, forming our current aviation oligopoly. McGee walks us through all the factors that led to Spirit’s liquidation—from jet fuel, to pricing squeeze from the Big Four airlines, to Trump’s proposed bailout and creditors seeking a payout. Despite the popular narratives you might hear on CNBC, Spirit’s undoing was multifaceted, with a history of blame going back 50 years, and many killers working in concert.

Check out the white paper “How to Fix Flying: A New Approach to Regulating the Airline Industry,” by William McGee and Ganesh Sitaraman. (Note: Sitaraman is the chair of the Prospect’s board.)

David Dayen is the executive editor of The American Prospect. He is the author of Monopolized: Life in the Age of Corporate Power and Chain of Title: How Three Ordinary Americans Uncovered Wall Street’s Great Foreclosure Fraud. He co-hosts the podcast Organized Money with Matt Stoller. He can be reached on Signal at ddayen.90. More by David Dayen

Matt Stoller is research director at the American Economic Liberties Project and the author of Goliath: The 100-Year War Between Monopoly Power and Democracy. More by Matt Stoller

Organized Money: Who Killed Spirit Airlines?

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