Domestic airlines in the United States are failing financially. Fine. Sure. We knew that. But here’s the kicker: They’ve been financially failing for 40 years, almost the entire time they’ve been popular. And that? Is fascinating. Back at the turn of the 20th century, a lot of the first electric utilities and long-distance railroad companies went bankrupt, because people couldn’t figure out how to make a profit in an industry with huge, fixed overhead costs. This is some evidence that the kinks haven’t totally been worked out on that, even today. (Via Matt Yglesias)