 These measures aided by the use of tax-loss credits enabled Pan Am to avert financial collapse and return to profitability in 1977.Since the 1930s Juan Trippe had coveted domestic routes for Pan Am.Through the late 1950s and early 1960s, and in the mid-1970s, there were talks of merging the airline with a domestic operator such as American Airlines, Eastern Air Lines, Trans World Airlines or United Airlines.