THE ALCHEMISTS who run America’s airlines are at it again, attempting to turn base metals into gold. US Airways’ almost $9 billion hostile bid for bankrupt Delta, if successful, would create the industry’s largest carrier and might be followed by the long-rumored merger of United with Continental, and American with bankrupt Northwest. Such consolidation would be the latest in a long line of proposed solutions to the industry’s perpetual losses: cartel-type regulation, deregulation, bankruptcy court protection, and government bail-outs.

America West, before absorbing US Airways, but keeping its name, filed for bankruptcy protection after the first Gulf War, and avoided a second such filing after September 11 only by arranging a government bail-out. US Airways twice filed for bankruptcy reorganization, in 2002 and 2004. Alfred Kahn, the former airline industry regulator who is considered the Godfather of airline deregulation, says, “It is ironic . . . that what has always been considered the financially weakest of the major carriers (US Airways) is proposing to take over what was once widely believed to be the strongest (Delta).”