Alitalia Woes Redux

As mentioned in an earlier article, Alitalia, the major (I hesitate to use the word premier) Italian airline has been hampered in their efforts to find a buyer by the actions of the unions at the airline. Just to reinforce this, one of the smaller unions at the airline went on strike yesterday to protest plans to sell the airline. The proposed buyers would slash the number of aircraft and thus union jobs. The strike forced Alitalia to cancel 40 flights.

So let's see if we can figure this one out. In order to keep the airline afloat, investors who want to buy the airline will have to cut jobs. So some will lose their jobs but others will keep theirs. The unions, or in this case, one small union, feels this is inadequate and strikes, just when the airline is running out of money, forcing the cancellation of lots of flights and thus reducing the amount of revenues that are needed to keep the airline going. This makes acquisition of the airline less appealing. So less chance for anyone to have a job left when the dust settles.

Good work there.