The companies as such aren’t at risk, only the investors. Take the cruise industry. If Carnival goes bust, the ships and crew will still be there. They will just be bought up by fresh investors at bargain prices and soon be up and running again. If long terms demand for cruises does fall some ships might be scrapped, but that would happen with or without a bailout. The risk of losing necessary infrastructure for that industry without a bailout is close to zero.

The same is true of most industries, bailouts protect investors not economic capacity, but there are exceptions. I don’t like it but there are very few big banks, and it’s just not possible for fresh investors to rapidly buy up the assets of a failed bank and start a new bank. The heavy regulation of the industry is a serous obstacle to that kind of renewal and this is a dangerous problem.