Then they’d be responsible to an all-powerful judge or trustee who can gut their excessive spending and force a renegotiation on the union contracts.
IOW, they’d actually have to change to become profitable. This way they can just stick it to the taxpayers. Why go through all that painful and less personally profitable change if you don’t have to?
If they stick it to the taxpayers, and enough angry taxpayers decide to boycott all their products as a result, these companies are going to go down the tubes anyway.
Buy Honda!