Hostess Warns Union If They Strike Plants Will Close; They Strike Anyway; Plants Closed…Outrage Ensues

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Zip @ Weasel Zippers:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pqUqgSW2NEs[/youtube]

The blood-sucking unions already drove Hostess into bankruptcy.

Via Dallas Morning News:

On the first business day after bakers went on strike against Hostess Brands, the Irving-based company said Monday it will permanently close three striking bakeries, putting 627 employees out of work.

Late Friday, the Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers International Union went on strike against Irving-based Hostess to protest cuts and give-backs in the company’s last, best, final contract offer. The contract, which was rejected by 92 percent of the union members who voted, called, in part, for 8 percent pay cuts, a company hiatus from contributions to a multi-employer pension plan and changes in work rules.

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What’s the problem? Unions play their cards and and companies fold, next time they might think twice before bankrupting a company. I am sure some third world businessmen will offer to buy the equipment and sell us the same pastries a day or two older. Isn’t this what Obama wanted, Wealth Redistribution with the world, reducing America’s standard of living and raising the standard of the Third World. LOL

The babies had their tantrums and the adults put them in a corner.
The only reason it’s news is that it is becoming so rare to see an adult response to childish behavior.

Hey union thugs….How do you like Dem cupcakes?

Why didn’t the president save the cup cakes?

And just in time for Christmas….I wonder what Barack O’Claus will put in their stocking and under their tree? Could it be some juicy food stamps and unemployment checks……. Somehow I doubt it will be the same as their paychecks. LOL. I love to see people get what they asked for and VOTED FOR.

My sympathies are for those who did not want to stike and did not vote for Barack O’Claus.

I posted this earlier today in the “Kroger” thread. Nothing like cutting off your nose to spite your face, is there?

The 130 year old company, Hostess Brands, filed for reorganizational bankruptcy in January of this year. Obviously the company wanted to try everything it could to stay in business. The company’s delivery drivers are Teamsters, who voted by a narrow margin to take a pay cut and benefit renegotiations in September rather than have the drivers lose their jobs in a down market. But the Bakery union say “No way” and decided on a strike rather than take a pay cut and reduced benefits. When the picket lines shut down the bakeries, the company, as it had warned, shut the doors in St. Louis, Cincinnatti and Seattle, PERMANENTLY. The company has announced that if it cannot renegotiate some of the union contracts, it will shut down the entire operation putting 18,300 workers out of a job.

I bet those Teamsters drivers are happy with the Bakery union tonight.

Unions are quick to demand to share in the good times, but when times get harsh, they don’t want to share in the harsh times. The Teamsters were smart. They knew the company was in trouble and figured a job with an 8% pay cut was better than no job at all.

This comes on the heels of the Feds announcing that they are going to cut funding for food stamps in Ohio where 1 in every 7 people are on food stamps, by $50/month, due to the mild 2011-2012 winter and the low cost of natural gas.

@ESeid:

Hey union thugs….How do you like Dem cupcakes?

You get my humor star for the day. They were all good, but this one had me laughing out loud, and I needed a good laugh today. Dem cupcakes, too much! LOL

As I watch America’s industrial power collapse all around the country, I feel removed from it all. We predicted the collapse and the cluelessness of “I Won” was obvious to almost half of America, but like a drunk, America needs to hit rock bottom before we can get back on track. Rock bottom is probably between 12 and 24 months away; I wonder what plans Jarrett and Axlegrinder will have for America after we tank.

Obama ran on hope and Limbaugh said, “I hope he fails,” it is long past the hope stage. Gold is going up and the stock market just fell down the outhouse hole, escalating food and energy prices will cause rioting and break America, but don’t worry, Obama has invested a lot of our money in green energy and his buddies have made a fortune developing this green energy, well, it energized their bank accounts and you need to start somewhere. Yahooo!

I’d like to see the exact numbers of those who voted against the new contract compared to those, within that group, who voted for Obama. My guess is that the numbers would be nearly equal.

Much like the question I posed on the ‘cannibal’ posting with Bill Whittle, these people essentially voted to take money away from the people that employ them, thereby ensuring that their jobs were ended. Only parasites continue to feed off of a dying host, killing it in the process. Therefore, these union bakers can be compared, with some degree of accuracy, to parasites. Lovely thought, isn’t it?

– I don’t know that I’d call it lovely, but it sure is accurate.

I work with unions. The union leadership can be reasonable or unreasonable. They will push and push, until forced to stop.

It would be interesting to read the actual contracts under negotiation. Are they negotiating fewer days off? Salary cuts? Salary restructuring? Are the present salaries compatible with the labor market? Are starting salarie to be lower?

Lots of questions. Lots can be negotiated to benefit both sides. For hostess to shut down is an extreme position and may be justified.

Corporation are not charities. Shareholders expect some type of return for investing in a company.

Unions have devolved to the point where the corporation is the enemy. It is a strange relationship, since the corporation provides the sustenance for the worker and his family. The worker acts like the child or the addict who only wants more and the company is put in the position of shutting down when the liability is no longer worth the effort to extract a profit. I suppose we will see many more corporations throw in the towels and with the job providers deciding to live off their capital rather than risking the possibilities of losing it all to unions and Obama.

It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker, that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interests. – Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations

Too many people either have forgotten that maxim, or have never learned it, or do not understand it’s meaning.

The result is the baker’s killing off their own prosperity and committing economic suicide.

@Skookum:

Dem cupcakes, too much! LOL

Hmmm…. I don’t know of many dems I’d call a cupcake. Most of the babes are on the R side, or working at Fox news. 😉

@Helene:

The company was requesting that the employees take an 8% pay cut. If they are making $20/hr. that comes to $1.60 per hour or a $64.00 pay cut on a 40 hour a week. What is worse: instead of earning $800 a week and losing your job completely, or earning $736.00 a week and still having a job. The company was trying to stay afloat. The Baker’s union prevented that in St. Louis, Cincinnatti and Seattle. No over 600 employees are without jobs and the company will rethink even staying open in other locations, risking the jobs of almost 18,000 other employees.

As I said before: unions are quick to demand part of the success, but refuse to wade through hard times with companies.

Over 80% of those union members who voted chose a 50%+ pay cut (unemployment) over a 7% pay cut and a JOB.
They bluffed with bad cards.
Their bluff got called.
Had Hostess been allowed to lower what they contribute to benefits and a 7% pay cut the bakeries would be humming today.
As to unions sometimes being reasonable, it is true.
Printers have a union.
It has cost millions to bring CA printshops up to union demands for safety and health (there are tons of solvents involved in printing).
But it was worth it.
The union members forwent raises in wages for three years in trade for those expensive safety systems to be bought and put in place.
Lately, last four years, we have seen tremendous improvements in individual worker productivity on the part of union printers.
As attrition was allowed to downsize the shop others picked up their slack.
Seems we could have been much more productive for decades IF those same union workers had been willing to work HARD all along.
Oh, well.
Hostess is already bankrupt.
The unions are nailing the coffin shut on themselves.
Maybe they’ve got something better lined up for themselves.

Let them(union) eat cake,I feel sorry for hostess.

@Nan G:

Nan, it was an 8% paycut being asked for by Hostess. But here is a suggestion: why didn’t the 17 union officers, whose combined salaries total well over $2,100,000.00/yr offer to take just a 5% pay cut and tell those union members they would help through the rough times by lowering their union dues, say for two years? Instead, the Baker’s union leadership encouraged the workers to strike, now the workers are out of a pay check all together, and the union president is still drawing his $224,000/yr salary.

Or maybe they should have not donated almost $1,400,000.00 to Democrats in the last couple of election cycles, reducing membership dues to help the workers out.

The left loves to talk about the “greedy” rich, but there are none so greedy as union leadership. They will let their members lose their jobs, but they will kill to keep theirs. I have absolutely no sympathy for the Baker’s union workers.

Don’t be surprised if Hostess turns up in Mexico.
A little hint: the union bosses don’t care if the plant closes. They still get a cut of the dues the unemployed members are expected to pay.

@Hard Right:

They will not turn up in Mexico. There are a number of right-to-work states that would welcome those jobs and if it becomes cost effective to move their plants to those states, like Texas, they will.

Stay out of ohio, the worker’s compensation program will kill your injured workers.

A private company can closes it doors at any time, with no answers given. Maybe the union boys and their families spend x-mas at the wipe house. opie-the fool and his alleged family will not be there for the holidays

Wonder if the wife is going to take Airforce II at $176,000/hr because her terrorist tramp husband has to “work”. Ever wonder who is screwing, other than the American public, when she is not around?

@Hard Right: If any of the states are allowed to leave the union, they likely will remain in the Mid West and the south!