Just another thought or two: The risk taken turned out to be more than it was supposed to be. I doubt if any one thought there was a risk of the bankruptcy laws not being followed. Your statement is true for the common stockholders.
Now as to the other: when you work for a living you get paid. Not always. I know a construction guy who was called in to help finish a job so the contractor could get finished on time (thereby avoiding penalties).
The contractor never paid him. We also have companies that have folded overnight, and the workers did not get their final pay checks.
As for the future, don't count on getting paid. Once it is ok to ignore the law, someone can choose to just ignore that little detail of paying people.
If that happens, look back at this period, and remember - they came for the bondholders before they came for the workers.
I still remember the point of the cold war. We (capitalist) strongly believed workers should get paid. That our labor is not some free gift to the greater good of the collective.
Americans did not stare down nuclear extinction for 45 years, for bondholders. I get your point about bondholders but the US will one day default on t-bills, since the debt is presently laughably unpayable and will only become more comedy as the years go by.
When default day comes will we put our debtors first before we pay the salaries of our military? No. We will just tell our debtors this is what we will pay, lol to the rest.
At the end of the day whether it is a stock, bond, or t-bill.. It’s all a risk. Since you are depending on someone else (not yourself) to generate the wealth.