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Hostess threatens to lay off 18,000 employees unless strike ends[W:521]

AdamT said:
However you look at it, management is to blame for driving the company into a ditch such that it felt it needed to slash payroll to carry on.
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You mean previous management is to blame because they accepted union contracts that paid too much and had too high of a cost of benefits to be sustainable, right?
 
Born Free said:
Further, Texas is a Right to Work State
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Then why are they having trouble with Unions? I thought the whole point of the "right to work" was to put unions out of business.
 
Lutherf said:
Hostess is in CH 11 right now and these cuts are part of that agreement. If they don't get these cuts then they can't complete the reorganization which only leaves the option of liquidation. The union is cutting off their nose despite their face but, frankly, it's the free market at work and I'm all for letting them reap the results of what they have sown.
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It is not the free market at work. In a free market those workers who have the common sense to take a pay cut to keep their job afloat would have the right to do so, and those who elected to strike would be forced to make a decision. Many of the unions, including the Teamsters, have seen the handwriting on the wall and chosen to work to save their jobs, and those who struck would have been replaced with some of the out of work 20 million. Less than 10% of the workers brought this situation into play.

Admit it or not, union labor is the last remaining monopoly, and like all monopolies, will fall under its own weight unless the results are legislated. Then all suffer.
 
Arbo said:
You mean previous management is to blame because they accepted union contracts that paid too much and had too high of a cost of benefits to be sustainable, right?
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That could be the case, sure.
 
AdamT said:
That could be the case, sure.
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A partisan that refuses to blame an establishment (the union) for their part in any of it. Go figure.
 
rocket88 said:
No, I'm saying a bullet to the head isn't what killed an animal that had already been run over by a bus. The immediate cause of death, perhaps. But anything at that point was just forestalling the inevitable.
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You don't know that Hostess's demise was inevitable; apparently that's just what you'd prefer to think. What's not in doubt is that the strike dealt the death blow.
 
AdamT said:
However you look at it, management is to blame for driving the company into a ditch such that it felt it needed to slash payroll to carry on.
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And again. We are talking about the here and now. This current management is not to blame, but the Union and it's members are.

You want to have a discussion about previous management then you better get the facts as to why they were not able to function within the market.
Paying $20 an hour to make Twinkies, is part of that reason. But it is a whole other topic and at this point, not pertinent to the actual decision made by the Union.



A business when faced with such absurdity from a Union should be able to sever all Union ties and start new. After all, the business does not belong to the Union or it's members.
The business should have been able to just fire everyone in that Union, and start fresh.
 
jimbo said:
It is not the free market at work. In a free market those workers who have the common sense to take a pay cut to keep their job afloat would have the right to do so, and those who elected to strike would be forced to make a decision. Many of the unions, including the Teamsters, have seen the handwriting on the wall and chosen to work to save their jobs, and those who struck would have been replaced with some of the out of work 20 million. Less than 10% of the workers brought this situation into play.

Admit it or not, union labor is the last remaining monopoly, and like all monopolies, will fall under its own weight unless the results are legislated. Then all suffer.
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I understand where you're coming from and don't necessarily think that you're wrong but i the larger view it is the free will of the employees to join a public union and the free will of the union to represent those employees in whichever way they see fit....even if it means doing so in a manner which utterly destroys all parties involved.
 
Harshaw said:
You don't know that Hostess's demise was inevitable; apparently that's just what you'd prefer to think. What's not in doubt is that the strike dealt the death blow.
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And was done so purposely!

They should be able to sue the Union for it's actions in doing it purposely.
 
Hostess threatens to lay off 18,000 employees unless strike ends

What do the fatcat shareholders get? Probably still getting their fat dividends and paying a tax rate lower than income tax rates.
 
Lutherf said:
I understand where you're coming from and don't necessarily think that you're wrong but i the larger view it is the free will of the employees to join a public union and the free will of the union to represent those employees in whichever way they see fit....even if it means doing so in a manner which utterly destroys all parties involved.
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Not true, many states are closed shop, meaning that if you want to work, you join the union and pay their dues. Government forces employees to accept unions. Government forces employers to accept unions, even when an employees chooses to build in a right to work state, unions sue and win on the basis that is it union busting, which is is and should be. Even after a plant has been approved and built. Think Boeing in SC.
 
Lutherf said:
I understand where you're coming from and don't necessarily think that you're wrong but i the larger view it is the free will of the employees to join a public union and the free will of the union to represent those employees in whichever way they see fit....even if it means doing so in a manner which utterly destroys all parties involved.
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One of my relatives is a member of a union not because he wants to be but because the cars of the people who aren't in the union often get damaged while their owners are more often the victims of workplace accidents.
 
jimbo said:
Not true, many states are closed shop, meaning that if you want to work, you join the union and pay their dues. Government forces employees to accept unions. Government forces employers to accept unions, even when an employees chooses to build in a right to work state, unions sue and win on the basis that is it union busting, which is is and should be. Even after a plant has been approved and built. Think Boeing in SC.
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I may be mistaken on this but it's my understanding that Taft-Hartley prohibited closed shops and union shops. I believe that an employee need not join a union as a requirement for that employment but that they may be required to pay the equivalent of union dues because he/she will reap the benefits of any union negotiated benefits.
 
Fisher said:
One of my relatives is a member of a union not because he wants to be but because the cars of the people who aren't in the union often get damaged while their owners are more often the victims of workplace accidents.
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I TOTALLY believe that could and does happen.
 
AliHajiSheik said:
What do the fatcat shareholders get? Probably still getting their fat dividends and paying a tax rate lower than income tax rates.
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Those fatcat shareholders are seeing the value of their risk capital drop to zero. Just like the value of the union jobs.

The stock has been delisted, which means no value. Everybody wins, even the government which now has another 18,500 unemployed.
 
Lutherf said:
I may be mistaken on this but it's my understanding that Taft-Hartley prohibited closed shops and union shops. I believe that an employee need not join a union as a requirement for that employment but that they may be required to pay the equivalent of union dues because he/she will reap the benefits of any union negotiated benefits.
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You could be right, but either way, the union has the negotiating power exclusively. Same result.
 
jimbo said:
Those fatcat shareholders are seeing the value of their risk capital drop to zero. Just like the value of the union jobs.

The stock has been delisted, which means no value. Everybody wins, even the government which now has another 18,500 unemployed.
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Actually shareholders get ****ed the most.
The union members still have part of their pension guaranteed by us, can still get medical care while being laid off, get unemployment benefits, etc.

The private equity holders get, whatever is left over after debt holders are paid, which is pennies on the dollar, if anything at all.
It's pretty crazy that a 1/3 of the employees can essentially rob, the rest of the people involved in this business.
 
Grim17 said:
Why is it always about what the other guy makes, rather than what you make? My mother always taught me that what other people have is none of my business, and to just worry about myself.
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In all fairness, you did start a thread in criticism of "that other guy" and his efforts to secure a higher wage for himself.
 
Harry Guerrilla said:
Actually shareholders get ****ed the most.
The union members still have part of their pension guaranteed by us, can still get medical care while being laid off, get unemployment benefits, etc.

The private equity holders get, whatever is left over after debt holders are paid, which is pennies on the dollar, if anything at all.
It's pretty crazy that a 1/3 of the employees can essentially rob, the rest of the people involved in this business.
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The shareholders are the low end of the totem pole, along with those losing their jobs. I think that the number of striking employees was around 1500 against 18,500 employed. That is around 8 or 9 %.

Maybe it is time for a vote of the employees to see whether they still want to remain members of a nonexistant union.
 
jimbo said:
The shareholders are the low end of the totem pole, along with those losing their jobs. I think that the number of striking employees was around 1500 against 18,500 employed. That is around 8 or 9 %.

Maybe it is time for a vote of the employees to see whether they still want to remain members of a nonexistant union.
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Yes and no, some of those losing their jobs get shafted, those that aren't part of the union.
Others, who are, don't loose nearly as much, as the gov offers a backstop for them.

I would agree, they should be allowed to opt out of the unions lunacy, to go back to work.
 
a351 said:
In all fairness, you did start a thread in criticism of "that other guy" and his efforts to secure a higher wage for himself.
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I have no issue with those workers trying to secure a better wage from the company, but that time had long since passed. They were left with a choice to either accept and 8% pay cut, or lose their jobs permanently. It was a no-brainer... Or you would have thought.

My response was to a post that was trying to make an issue out of management/executive pay, which was absolutely irrelevant to this issue.
 
Grim17 said:
I have no issue with those workers trying to secure a better wage from the company, but that time had long since passed.

My response was to a post that was trying to make an issue out of management/executive pay, which was absolutely irrelevant to this issue.
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That's ultimately their judgement.

Quite obviously costs had to be minimized in some manner, why wouldn't executive and managerial pay come into play at some point in the talks?
 
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