Airlines for America, the trade association for the U.S. airline industry, joined the rest of the airline industry in calling on Congress to act quickly to protect airlines and their employees.
In a letter to Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin, Reps. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and Kevin McCarthy (R-CA), and Sens. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) and Chuck Schumer (R-NY), the group asked Congress to act quickly to save the industry and the 11 million jobs it represents or supports.
“The rapid spread of COVID-19 and the government- and business-imposed restrictions on air travel are having never-before-seen impacts on U.S. aviation and our employees,” the industry representatives wrote. “The breadth and immediacy of the need to act cannot be overstated. It is urgent and unprecedented.”
The association said airlines were stronger than they have ever been going into the crisis created by coronavirus with 750,000 direct employees as of 2019, and more than 10 million jobs that were supported by the industry.
But, the association said, the pandemic has caused rapid economic damage to the industry in a short time.
“Carriers are burning through cash as cancellations far outpace new bookings for U.S. carriers, planes are only 20-30 percent full and new bookings are implying 70-80 percent declines in traffic even as airlines make dramatic cuts in capacity — and this is getting worse each day. Right now, the collective burn rate for the U.S. airline industry is $10 billion per month,” the association said in a blog post.
On March 16, Airlines for American asked Congress for $54 billion bailout for the airline industry comprised of $29 billion grants for both passenger and cargo carriers and another $25 billion in loans and tax incentives to help the industry respond to the coronavirus.