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 Andrew1975 wrote:

 KalashnikovMarine wrote:
The average Union IS corporate greed personified. It's a second corporation to work for. A bunch of corrupt fat cats who will happily sell the workers out in a minute if it keeps the dues rolling in and some nice kickbacks from the companies their workers are employed by.

Wait isn't that what they would have been doing by accepting the deal? The didn't sell out the workers and they will no longer be getting dues. They stood up against the rampant carpetbagging that is taking over corporate America.[quote/]

Not at all, if they'd accepted the deal they would have kept their workers EMPLOYED. The Unions struck out of their own greed against a COURT ORDER and lost over 18,000 people their jobs. Was the Management in the wrong here? Yes absolutely but the Unions struck the death blow.

 Andrew1975 wrote:

Bust the unions. ALL OF THEM, then try it again with some very strict limits on what unions can do with dues and limits on what union leadership can make financially. The list of reforms needed is long, but till then unions are just another corrupt enemy of any schmuck trying to make an honest living.

This is ridiculous, yes, not all unions are perfect and some go too far, but this wave of anti union sentiment that I see is for the most part uncalled for. What exactly did the Union do wrong here? I see too many people buying into this evil Union rhetoric that corporate America is really trying to sell the American people. If it was not for Unions there would be nobody to oppose corporations from treating their employees however they please. You want Union reform, thats fine, I want Corporate reform first!

In the last ten years we have witnessed the evisceration of the middle class in this country. It's not because of Unions, I'll tell you that. It was because of uncontrolled corporate greed. The Unions appear to be one of the few forces defending middle class jobs, from CEOs that make millions of dollars but cry for the shareholders. So many corporations and even the government have tried to deflect much of the blame onto the Unions, don't drink the cool aid. Unions are for right now a necessary evil and are being attacked by some pretty powerful and rich lobbies for that reason.

The Unions are NO DIFFERENT then the bloody CEOs. They're exploiting the working and middle classes just as badly as the company themselves! Look at the salaries of the Union bosses and the way they live. They don't fight fat cats, they are fat cats exploiting you and your labor. You wanna rail against the 1%? Check the headquarters of the Unions, it's just another place for the rich and power to shack up. Call me a scab all you want but I'm damn proud of negotiating for myself and not paying dues into a corrupt system. Sure the boss at the top is still corrupt and fething me over, but at least I only have one boss ripping me off instead of two.

Not at all, if they'd accepted the deal they would have kept their workers EMPLOYED. The Unions struck out of their own greed against a COURT ORDER and lost over 18,000 people their jobs. Was the Management in the wrong here? Yes absolutely but the Unions struck the death blow.

Wouldn't accepting the cuts been selling out their workers to make a buck, just as you said? The union gets nothing from shutting down hostess. But forcing members to take a pay cut while management gets giant raises, just so they could keep those Union dues rolling is it exactly as you put "Selling out the workers". Choose an argument and stick to it please.

A responsible corporate manager wouldn't take from the employees while rewarding themselves with a big giant raise. It's insulting and I can see why they didn't take the cuts. The question is why didn't the bankruptcy judgment put a cap on or even freeze corporate salaries. Why were the employees, who make no management decisions being the only ones punished for.......and wait for it.......MISMANAGEMENT! The whole thing stinks of corporate rats leaving a sinking ship. Management knew the corporation would not likely survive, so they made sure to get as much money out as they could, screw the employees.

I'm not calling you a scab. I'm self employed and have no particular love for Unions, but I would never agree to a deal that is so obviously unfair. Anytime someone has the gall to take a giant pay raise with one hand and tells workers they have to cut their pay and benefits, people should be outraged. Either we are all in this together or we are not. Clearly management was not interested in saving the company, so why should the Union.

What sucks is again the middle class worker gets screwed either way. Take a pay cut or lose your jobs, doesn't matter to management, they have already got their giant salaries and I'm sure some pretty nice Golden parachutes. If management was willing to take the same kind of cuts, then maybe the union would have seen fit to negotiate....but that didn't happen. How could a union rep ever advice their people to take this deal, when it was obviously so lopsided.

Yeah there's two side to this story.
Theres the side of unemployed workers that voted to keep thier jobs in exchange for a 25% stake in the company, 2 spots on the board of directors, an 8% pay cut followed by a subsequent 4% raise over what was it 4 years? Sure let's go with that.
And on the other side you have the unemployed workers who didn't just cause thier own unemployment they put 2 times thier own number out of work. So yeah for some reason I blame the union.

Because there was one side that was not only not interested in concessions, they voted themselves giant raises on the backs of ALL the employees. This shows no real interest in fixing the problem which was mismanagement.

Unions are supposed to do whats best for the Employees.

They made the employees lose their Jobs instead of taking a small paycut and keeping their job and benifits.

 Grey Templar wrote:
Unions are supposed to do whats best for the Employees.

They made the employees lose their Jobs instead of taking a small paycut and keeping their job and benifits.

Again how could you possibly tell your employees that the best thing to do is take a pay cut when the compensation committee of Hostess's board approved an increase in then-chief executive Brian Driscoll's salary to $2.55 million from around $750,000. So this guy who is flushing the company down the toilet gets a raise of almost $2 Million dollars a year, but the workers have to take a pay cut? Who's best interests are they serving....sounds like Driscoll's. That kind of raise should be illegal.

 KalashnikovMarine wrote:
Bust the unions. ALL OF THEM, then try it again with some very strict limits on what unions can do with dues and limits on what union leadership can make financially. The list of reforms needed is long, but till then unions are just another corrupt enemy of any schmuck trying to make an honest living.

The answer is not to pull all the teeth out of the unions but place controls on the way that corporate bosses manage companies. It's clear that those at the top were only interested in lining their own pockets quickly while the company went tits up. And they, like many of those leaping in to bash the union, basically expect the masses of workers to cover the bosses doing this by just bending over and accepting a big pay cut. And it's the unions and workers who are apparently in the wrong here, because they didn't just lie down and agree to being shafted so the company could limp a long a bit longer to give those running it a bit more time to get money out of it.

It doesn't matter if a few managers end up out of a job, it does matter when many thousands of workers end up out of work, it matter to the economy, the load on the social support system and upon the local/wider economy. So why are so many against the workers and the union's demands and thing the solution to prevent this happening in future is to see the unions gutted and stripped of powers instead of doing something about the gak heads running these companies into the ground expecting the workers to feel all the pain just so they can get out with a massive payout?

Apparently resisting being treated like a doormat and being asked to prop up a sinking company while the bosses raid the accounts means the workers are in the wrong. The government should regulate business more, but I knew that this thread would be full of people lining up to kick the unions. Because that's the US way, you'll never regulate businesses in the way that they need to protect the workers because it goes against the enthusiasm for capitalism and the 'land of opportunity' ideal, which appears to mean that people who are rich and clever can tread on everyone else. Anything else would be socialism. It doesn't help anyone when big companies go down costing thousands of jobs, so why is the law made in a way that allows executives to loot a company for their own well being instead of having controls in place to protect the company and workers first? As long as businesses can be run this way, they always will be. All 'reforming' the unions to heavily restrict what they can do will play into the hands of people wanting to exploit companies with little regard for the future welfare of the company or it's staff.

Its still NOT in the best interest of the Employees to lose their Job.

Irregardless of irresponsable executive salaries(the increase of which really would only pay for a handful of employee salaries) its better the take a small pay cut then to lose your job completely.

I wouldn't call 8% a 'small pay cut', but that's just me.

Compared to losing your job, its small.

Careful with the word 'Irregardless '...

I was threatened being punched in the nuts using that word...

That's because it's not really a word. What he meant was 'regardless', the irritating prefix is entirely superfluous.

 Grey Templar wrote:
Its still NOT in the best interest of the Employees to lose their Job.

Irregardless of irresponsable executive salaries(the increase of which really would only pay for a handful of employee salaries) its better the take a small pay cut then to lose your job completely.

So your of the opinion that people should just shut up and be taken advantage of. Good to know.

Grey Templar wrote:Its still NOT in the best interest of the Employees to lose their Job.

Irregardless of irresponsable executive salaries(the increase of which really would only pay for a handful of employee salaries) its better the take a small pay cut then to lose your job completely.

"Irregardless" is not even the dumbest thing you said in that post. Think about that.

Your statement effectively translates to "it's better to be abused by your boss than to not work at all". But I suspect that will be lost on you, so I'll put it another way for you:

Would you ever sell your house for less than half its market value? No, of course not. So then why would you sell your time and energy like that?

My point is, it was in their best interest to take the paycut and keep their jobs. They can fight for an increase to their pay once the company can afford it.

The Executives getting a pay raise was wrong, but it is the priviledge of the Executive position.

You can't win every fight, and sometimes you need to consider if its better to just take the insult and be better off for it. Or stand up for whats right. In this case, it was clearly better to take the pay cut and resolve the other issues at a later date.

Grey Templar wrote:My point is, it was in their best interest to take the paycut and keep their jobs. They can fight for an increase to their pay once the company can afford it.

The Executives getting a pay raise was wrong, but it is the priviledge of the Executive position.

You can't win every fight, and sometimes you need to consider if its better to just take the insult and be better off for it. Or stand up for whats right. In this case, it was clearly better to take the pay cut and resolve the other issues at a later date.

So how much of a pay cut would you draw the line at?

Take a 25% pay cut or lose your job?
Take a 50% pay cut or lose your job?
Take a 75% pay cut or lose your job?
Take a 90% pay cut or lose your job?
Why don't you work for Mexican-strawberry-picker wages? Your alternative is to not work at all!

Where do you draw the line, Grey Templar? I honestly am curious to know. And do remember that an appeaser is one who feeds the crocodile, hoping it will eat him last.

EDIT: "[getting a pay raise] is the priviledge of the executive position" really needs some form of citation. I'm unclear on exactly how that was determined.

 azazel the cat wrote:

Grey Templar wrote:My point is, it was in their best interest to take the paycut and keep their jobs. They can fight for an increase to their pay once the company can afford it.

The Executives getting a pay raise was wrong, but it is the priviledge of the Executive position.

You can't win every fight, and sometimes you need to consider if its better to just take the insult and be better off for it. Or stand up for whats right. In this case, it was clearly better to take the pay cut and resolve the other issues at a later date.

So how much of a pay cut would you draw the line at?

Take a 25% pay cut or lose your job?
Take a 50% pay cut or lose your job?
Take a 75% pay cut or lose your job?
Take a 90% pay cut or lose your job?
Why don't you work for Mexican-strawberry-picker wages? Your alternative is to not work at all!

Where do you draw the line, Grey Templar? I honestly am curious to know.

Having a job.

Depends on the job and my ability to find a replacement. Plus the cost of living.

If the pay cut means I lose income I NEED to survive. Then no I won't take the cut. Although the more likely scenerio is I keep the job while looking for another one. Some income is better then none at all.

If its just cramping my disposable income, then I'll take it.



Given the circumstances of this situation and the Economy, I'd say an 8% cut is more then reasonable.

whembly wrote:

 azazel the cat wrote:

Take a 90% pay cut or lose your job?
Why don't you work for Mexican-strawberry-picker wages? Your alternative is to not work at all!

Where do you draw the line, Grey Templar? I honestly am curious to know.

Having a job.

If that is truly the case, then please understand, Whembley, my heartfelt desire to hear that you become forced to pick lettuce for 3 cents a head just to avoid starvation.

 Grey Templar wrote:

The Executives getting a pay raise was wrong, but it is the priviledge of the Executive position.

Therein lies the problem. It's accepted 'privilege' of the executives to be able to line their own pockets at the expense of the workers and the company's future.

Grey Templar wrote:Given the circumstances of this situation and the Economy, I'd say an 8% cut is more then reasonable.

I'm calling shenanigans on this for two reasons:
1. Workers taking an 8% pay cut in order to pay for the CEO's bonus because the CEO has done such a poor job that the company cannot afford his bonus is not reasonable.

2. I am sick of hearing about the economy being used as an excuse. I'm pretty sure the consumer-facing Twinkie industry is immune to a bear market.

 Grey Templar wrote:
Hostess could possably have survived if the Union in question had accepted the cuts. Granted, Hostess may not have survived in the long run, but the immediate cause of Hostess's failure is this Union.

Which puts the blame for the loss of Jobs squarely on the Baker's Union. Both their own members and the members of the other Union.

Wow..I completely disagree with this. Did you see the story where the Union already made huge concessions years before in an effort to help the company, yet the managers continued in their mismanagement? Not to mention the nice raise the management team gave themselves.

I have never been in a union, but I have worked with and around unions and even have managed union personnel. I will tell you that there are certainly bad apples in unions but I will tell you that unions are absolutely a necessary evil in many cases. Without union representation you would have plant managers taking advantage of their workers left and right. When I managed union workers, I was asked to do things( that I refused to do) by my upper management that were unethical, but many other managers and supervisors were willing to do in an effort to curry favor for their ambitions to move up the corporate ladder.

I have experienced the negative side of unions as well, where they file grievances to try and get free money, file grievances to protect job classifications...Electricians cant turn a screw because "that's the carpenters job"..so projects get delayed for days, file grievances because a salaried person moved a small part 10 feet. That's the bad side.

GG

generalgrog wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
Hostess could possably have survived if the Union in question had accepted the cuts. Granted, Hostess may not have survived in the long run, but the immediate cause of Hostess's failure is this Union.

Which puts the blame for the loss of Jobs squarely on the Baker's Union. Both their own members and the members of the other Union.

Wow..I completely disagree with this. Did you see the story where the Union already made huge concessions years before in an effort to help the company, yet the managers continued in their mismanagement? Not to mention the nice raise the management team gave themselves.

I have never been in a union, but I have worked with and around unions and even have managed union personnel. I will tell you that there are certainly bad apples in unions but I will tell you that unions are absolutely a necessary evil in many cases. Without union representation you would have plant managers taking advantage of their workers left and right. When I managed union workers, I was asked to do things( that I refused to do) by my upper management that were unethical, but many other managers and supervisors were willing to do in an effort to curry favor for their ambitions to move up the corporate ladder.

I have experienced the negative side of unions as well, where they file grievances to try and get free money, file grievances to protect job classifications...Electricians cant turn a screw because "that's the carpenters job"..so projects get delayed for days, file grievances because a salaried person moved a small part 10 feet. That's the bad side.

GG

I agree with just about every word of this.

Damn you, Grey Templar! You've made me agree with GeneralGrog about something!

 azazel the cat wrote:

whembly wrote:

 azazel the cat wrote:

Take a 90% pay cut or lose your job?
Why don't you work for Mexican-strawberry-picker wages? Your alternative is to not work at all!

Where do you draw the line, Grey Templar? I honestly am curious to know.

Having a job.

If that is truly the case, then please understand, Whembley, my heartfelt desire to hear that you become forced to pick lettuce for 3 cents a head just to avoid starvation.

Thanks buddy

There was a time in my life that I had to work 4 jobs at the same time... I have an idea what its like to be in that position.

In this case... the Teamster approved the dealio... the Baker's Union did not. That should tell you something.

Blaming it on the CEO's pay itself is disingenuous... bad management overall played a part of this problem as it's their 2nd bankruptcy.

 Grey Templar wrote:
My point is, it was in their best interest to take the paycut and keep their jobs. They can fight for an increase to their pay once the company can afford it.

The Executives getting a pay raise was wrong, but it is the priviledge of the Executive position.

You can't win every fight, and sometimes you need to consider if its better to just take the insult and be better off for it. Or stand up for whats right. In this case, it was clearly better to take the pay cut and resolve the other issues at a later date.

This is the same argument I hear from all the Rush Limbaugh addicts. The rich and powerful are never at fault. Blame the Unions. Its crap, Executive privilege is pure crap. The fact that somehow the right wing has been able to turn the middle class against itself and actually stand up for these bastards makes me sick.

 generalgrog wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
Hostess could possably have survived if the Union in question had accepted the cuts. Granted, Hostess may not have survived in the long run, but the immediate cause of Hostess's failure is this Union.

Which puts the blame for the loss of Jobs squarely on the Baker's Union. Both their own members and the members of the other Union.

Wow..I completely disagree with this. Did you see the story where the Union already made huge concessions years before in an effort to help the company, yet the managers continued in their mismanagement? Not to mention the nice raise the management team gave themselves.

I have never been in a union, but I have worked with and around unions and even have managed union personnel. I will tell you that there are certainly bad apples in unions but I will tell you that unions are absolutely a necessary evil in many cases. Without union representation you would have plant managers taking advantage of their workers left and right. When I managed union workers, I was asked to do things( that I refused to do) by my upper management that were unethical, but many other managers and supervisors were willing to do in an effort to curry favor for their ambitions to move up the corporate ladder.

I have experienced the negative side of unions as well, where they file grievances to try and get free money, file grievances to protect job classifications...Electricians cant turn a screw because "that's the carpenters job"..so projects get delayed for days, file grievances because a salaried person moved a small part 10 feet. That's the bad side.

GG

Well... the biggest benefit of Union shop are the safety measures.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Start making your own!

 AustonT wrote:

 Ouze wrote:
I knew this story when posted here would blame the union. And indeed, their hands aren't really clean in this, no question. But please, lets not pretend that this is all because of the evil unions. This are two sides to the story.

No one is questioning that Hostess was mismanaged, hense why they're in bankruptcy twice in a decade., you also note dispute the title of your link "Fox Ignores Hostess' Array Of Troubles To Scapegoat Union For Liquidation" there's not a single link to a Fox page ITT. The reason why we're blaming the union, is BECAUSE IT'S THE UNIONS FAULT. Even the OTHER union says so.

I wasn't trying to make this about Fox News, so please ignore that element of the page. The reason I used that page is because it had the best timeline of stories that showed the considerable, even equal; role that corporate mismanagement played in them going under. FFS, did you read that link about them going into bankruptcy with $650 million in debt and coming out with $800; and about all the concessions the unions had made in the previous decades?

I mean, you can decide that we live in a complex world where there are cascades of failures over the course of years of missteps in several avenues and another bankruptcy was likely inevitable within the next year or two regardless of the result of the labor dispute. Or, if you prefer, we can live in a simplistic world where the union struck for higher wages even though they knew it would cost them their jobs because they are stupid and short sighted, even though even a casual application of common sense would show that the situation couldn't possibly have been that simple. I guess it's your call.

 whembly wrote:

Well... the biggest benefit of Union shop are the safety measures.

That is certainly part of it...but there is also elimination of sweatshop conditions. For example..lets say you have worked 14, 12 hour days in a row and you are looking forward to a day off when your supervisor at the end of your 14th day, tells you you need to work yet another 7, 12 hour days in a row, so the plant can get 1 day ahead of schedule.(looks good on MGT reports, but otherwise meaningless).

Unions can help prevent worker abuse like this. There are many managers who think of workers as nothing more than beasts of burden that they can use up churn out to help their numbers look better.

Undocumented labor has it the worst. because if they complain, all of a sudden the INS shows up at their trailer. And there are 3 more waiting in line to take that complainers place.

GG

People who use this as another reason to bash Unions have no understanding of the issue. We can repeatedly see the unions making deals to keep the jobs in the past. Had the offer been acceptable I believe they would have taken it. While it may be "executive privilege" to give themselves raises, the Union has the privilege of turning down offers that are clearly disingenuous.

By Templars logic the Union should have taken any offer that was provided just to keep them working. That is not what Unions are for, you don't even need Unions at that point.

What I think you will see is that the corporation and funds that owned hostess were not really interested in saving the company. More money will be made by selling the IP and liquidating assets then they saw ever returning from actually running the business. This happens all the time.

The question I have is how were they running so poorly. I mean hostess is a big respected brand. It probably was the most respected and recognized in its industry. Little Debbie by comparison seams almost generic does the same thing and charges about half and makes a profit. Something really messed up here.

whembly wrote:

 azazel the cat wrote:

whembly wrote:

 azazel the cat wrote:

Take a 90% pay cut or lose your job?
Why don't you work for Mexican-strawberry-picker wages? Your alternative is to not work at all!

Where do you draw the line, Grey Templar? I honestly am curious to know.

Having a job.

If that is truly the case, then please understand, Whembley, my heartfelt desire to hear that you become forced to pick lettuce for 3 cents a head just to avoid starvation.

Thanks buddy

There was a time in my life that I had to work 4 jobs at the same time... I have an idea what its like to be in that position.

So then why voice a comment so contradictory to understanding "what it is like to be in that position"? Is it pure spite? or is that strange laissez-faire-capitalist zeitgeist of "I've got mine so feth you"?

Honestly, I would like to know: I just cannot figure it out.

 azazel the cat wrote:

whembly wrote:

 azazel the cat wrote:

whembly wrote:

 azazel the cat wrote:

Take a 90% pay cut or lose your job?
Why don't you work for Mexican-strawberry-picker wages? Your alternative is to not work at all!

Where do you draw the line, Grey Templar? I honestly am curious to know.

Having a job.

If that is truly the case, then please understand, Whembley, my heartfelt desire to hear that you become forced to pick lettuce for 3 cents a head just to avoid starvation.

Thanks buddy

There was a time in my life that I had to work 4 jobs at the same time... I have an idea what its like to be in that position.

So then why voice a comment so contradictory to understanding "what it is like to be in that position"? Is it pure spite? or is that strange laissez-faire-capitalist zeitgeist of "I've got mine so feth you"?

Honestly, I would like to know: I just cannot figure it out.

Because, it's never as simple as Unions vs Management.

It happens... move on, adapt, and overcome.

How can you need 4 jobs? How many hours were you working?