Another bad joke ...."Italy just can’t break up with Alitalia.
And it's an expensive relationship. After at least six failed rescue plans over the past 12 years, the Italian government has once again stepped in to prop up its flag carrier, now bludgeoned by the coronavirus crisis. Rome has decided to
renationalize it with more than €3 billion of public money.
For both ordinary Italian voters and European Commission officials policing government subsidies, questions about how long Italy can keep treating an airline as the most sacred of cows (and keep shoveling money into a black hole) are only growing louder.
“Italians see Alitalia as a spaghetti strainer — you pour in money and it comes straight out,” said one former manager.
Indeed, the company has burned through an eye-watering €10 billion in bailouts and loans since it was privatized in 2008.
“You could say the coronavirus has been both the worst thing and the best thing for Alitalia,” the manager continued. “The losses have been enormous, but it has given the government an excuse to nationalize.”
https://www.politico.eu/article/alit...alian-to-fail/