C-Series RIP

Bombardier shelves C-Series project: This is funny, in a bleak, bitter kind of way. Even with the taxpayers picking up, what was it, a third of the tab, they still can't make a business case for it. Another way of looking at it: your elected representatives, at every level of government, were lining up to throw hundreds of millions of dollars at this dog*, when even the company wasn't wholly sold on it. Best part: it spares the Tories the aggravation of killing the deal. Oh, sorry, that was the old, "ideological" Tories. Rather, it spares the Tories the embarrassment of carrying on with the deal. INNOCENT QUESTION: Just because they aren't actually building any jets, does Bombardier have to give back the money? *Not that the merits of the C-Series are the issue. Coyne's Fork on this is remorseless and absolute: If the project is uneconomic, it shouldn't get a subsidy. If it's economic, it doesn't need one. BY REQUEST: Here's my most recent column (I think) on la folie Bombardier. Key line: "The willingness of other countries to subsidize their aerospace industries ... makes the case against subsidizing Bombardier, rather than for it." BONUS: Here's some others.