Issue Summary

In 2005, the government of struggling Samoa decided its taxpayers had more pressing needs than endless subsidies for state-owned Polynesian Airlines. So Samoa accepted an offer from a promising and profitable Australian low-cost carrier called Virgin Blue, which put up the ideas and money to start a new national airline that could sustain itself. The project worked so well that some years later, Abu Dhabi’s Etihad and the government of the Seychelles followed a similar plan when Etihad rescued Air Seychelles.