My aunt and I are taking a flight soon.

[Ocelot II]

26. Air traffic controllers are paid pretty well, and they should be.

It's a high-stress job with enormous responsibility. But the fact that they are paid well (when they do get paid) has nothing to do with the fairness of withholding anybody's paycheck or with the consequences not only to the employee but to everyone who might be downstream of that paycheck. Those normally well-paid air traffic controllers won't be buying stuff or paying other people who rely on them, and this is true to various degrees of all of the people who aren't getting paid, no matter how large or small their missing paychecks might be.