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The story of what has gone wrong at Boeing is a classic example of a common form of corporate management failure, and as such carries lessons far beyond the company itself.

The flaw is to prioritise short-term profits over the long-term interests of customers, staff and, eventually, investors too. Businesses make mistakes in all sorts of ways: expanding into areas they know nothing about, running up too much debt, failing to adapt to changes in customer tastes, and so on.

But the danger of cutting corners to boost the bottom line happens again and again, and the example of Boeing will be taught in business schools as a “what not to do” case study for years to come.

This is a story about a company, but it is also one about our market capitalist economic system, and indeed about corporate morality more generally.

The problems of the latest versions of the 737 – Boeing 737 Max 8 and 737 Max 9 – have been widely reported. It remains the best-selling jet aircraft of all time, just ahead of the Airbus A320. However, production was halted after the tragic loss of two aircraft in 2018 and 2019 with the loss of 346 lives, and legal issues regarding those crashes continue.

We don’t yet know the full story of the cause of this latest near-catastrophe, when the plane suffered a rapid decompression shortly after take off from Portland airport,........

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