Unions Bankrupt Another Great American Company.

[Old Ridge Runner]

"Force employers to pay retired workers", really Sarge? Ever heard of a contract? That is what each and every company signed with the union representing their employees. If they had no intention of living up to the obligations of those contracts, why did they sign them? Can you sign a contract for anything and then years later just say, "I didn't mean it, so the contract is null and void."

I am sick of you righties biatching about companies and state governments having to live up to legal contracts that they have entered into freely. The reason GM is in over it's head with their pension plan is because for 50 years or more the company gave the money to their shareholders instead of putting it into the pension fund, no one's fault but the managements, certainly not the hourly workers who voted to except all those contracts at face value.

When one has share holder the company is required to pay them. You say that the company has a requirement to pay what was negoiated in the union contract and want them to ignore the obligations to their share holders, the people who invested in the company and allowed the company to expand. It is not the company's responsibility to take care of their employees after they retire. It is upto the employee to take care of himself. The should have save from their retirement and invested their money in a few companies so that they would have an income besides social security to live off of. Have you heard of IRAs and 401Ks, if the employees did not take advantage of one of them it is their fault and not that of the company they work for.

 

[Old Ridge Runner]

Bullshit ORR. Hostess knew that they were going to have that debt sometime in the future when they signed the contracts. They chose not to put the money aside to meet those obligations, instead gave it out as stock dividends and bonuses to higher management. While the piper's bill must be paid and the time has come to pay it. If they didn't want to pay him, they shouldn't have agreed to have him play.

You know this for a fact? I think it is just more leftist BS because they see their Dear Leader following apart at the seams. If Hostess did not pay the dividends to the stock holders they would have gone out of business because of lawsuits and people pulling their investments out of the company and the left would be crying again.

 

[Old Ridge Runner]

So it's all the worker's fault ORR, bad or poor management couldn't have had anything to do with it? Bullshit. Back during the Reagan Glory Days, I got laid off along with 1199 fellow union members and not two months later the president of the company got a fat bonus check of $500,000 for saving the company money. If compnaies don't want to pay their workers a living wage, then the upper management folks shouldn't get one either.

1. It is the responsibility of the worker to see to his own future, not that of the company.

2. When you signed on to the company you worked for you knew what the company was willing to pay you, if you didn't like the amount you could found another job. You could have found another company that would pay you a so called "living wage."

 

[OldGaffer]

You know this for a fact? I think it is just more leftist BS because they see their Dear Leader following apart at the seams. If Hostess did not pay the dividends to the stock holders they would have gone out of business because of lawsuits and people pulling their investments out of the company and the left would be crying again.

So you put the interests of the shareholders above the interests of the employees? And it is OK to shafte the workers out of their benefits in order to give out dividends to the shareholders? Is that your stance?

 

[888888]

Twinkies Maker Preparing for Chapter 11 Filing

Hostess Brands Inc. is preparing to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection as soon as this week, said people familiar with the matter, a move that would mark the second significant court restructuring for the Twinkies and Wonder Bread baker in the past several years.

Once in bankruptcy court, Hostess will try to reduce debt and renegotiate labor contracts, many of them with the International Brotherhood of Teamsters and the Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers International Union, the people said. Hostess plans to file court papers soon threatening to reject or modify labor contracts under applicable bankruptcy rules, the people said. Such moves provide troubled companies a bargaining chip to try and get concessions from unionized workers.

A Teamsters spokesman declined to comment. A spokeswoman for Hostess's other main union didn't immediately respond to a request for comment.

It pays about $100 million a year into so-called multi-employer pension plans that cover workers at a wide array of companies, the people said. Hostess, whose pension plan is underfunded by about $2 billion, wants to rescind its obligations to that plan and start paying into a plan that only covers its own workers, one of the people said.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204124204577151211961572458.html

another company that made promises to their workers but then didn't follow through over the years and put the money away that they needed too. Now because they stoled money from themselves that should have been saved to pay legacy cost went to high exc's and div to stock owners to prop up the price so the people who ran the company could get bigger benefits.

NOW IT"S THE WORKERS FAULT OF COURSE. has anyone got a contract that was written by a union, if you do pleas show it to me, because all the union contracts that i ever negotiated I asked for what I would want and the company told us what we could have. We never once told them this is what we will get.

 

[888888]

1. It is the responsibility of the worker to see to his own future, not that of the company.

2. When you signed on to the company you worked for you knew what the company was willing to pay you, if you didn't like the amount you could found another job. You could have found another company that would pay you a so called "living wage."

You are 100% right, the union had a legal contract that the company agreed too and signed it. The company required you to this and that and follow these rules. And the company said they would take this part of their money they made and provide these wages and benefits.

A living wage to you ridge is whatever we decide to pay you, and that can change as we see fit. Why would a company not do what they said they would do. I can see them running out of money and closing shop, but that doesn't mean you don't have to pay what you owe, that you saved but now want to say well we need that money back. And going forward we don't want to keep paying what we owe. what we promised.

I wonder what a company would do if they had found out that a group of employee weren't doing the work they were hired for, but was putting their hours in at another job and just stopping back to pick up their checks. You would say this is fraud.

 

[middleview]

years ago companies provided pensions. it was common that the pension was part of your compensation. in the 70s William E Simon was secretary of the treasury. He changed the rules related to how a company capitalized their pensions. Then he left government service and started a company called "Wesray". They raided companies that had fully funded their pensions, lent the pension money to themselves and had the company "forgive" the loans....then they'd sell the company. The now underfunded pensions were in compliance with Simon's rules and so the buyers were typically not aware of the new liability. Lots of companies were left without the money to pay retirement benefits.....but Simon became quite wealthy....in much the same way that Bain and Romney got their money.

Look....you guys argue against unions, saying "if the worker doesn't like what the employer wants to pay they should go elsewhere", but don't seem to apply the same thought process to the unions...."if the worker doesn't want to belong to a union they should go to a non-union company".....your logic sucks, but if you want to think it applies to one case then it certainly applies in the other.

The reasoning for not having a "right to work" law as they are usually written, is that the employer can use threats against employees to get rid of the union. If the union negotiates for wages and benefits for workers, how does it make sense to you that a worker can refuse to pay the dues to the union, but at the same time take advantage of the union negotiations?

There is no doubt that some unions became abusive....there is also no doubt that some CEOs are abusive. The CEO of United HealthCare got a $100 million paycheck last year. How could you argue to the workers that they have no right to demand higher wages when that kind of information hits the news? I worked for a company that a week after they had announced to the employees that the average raise that year would be 1% and only the top 5% could get a 3% raise.....the CFO got a raise in excess of 50%....At that moment I'd have voted for a union.

 

[middleview]

If you buy 1000 shares in Apple, how much of that money goes to Apple? Since the answer is $0, how can you argue that your money is helping the company expand?

If the company hires you and part of the deal is your salary plus your pension....at what point is it ok for the company to say "Ahhh, never mind. We've liquidated the pension and you are screwed. Tough shit". The problem comes in when the company doesn't fund the pension. The government set the rules back when Nixon was president that the pension fund could set an expected return rate on their investments that was wildly optimistic to say the least.....companies did that. If they end up going broke because of the pension then it was because they made bad decisions about funding the pension in the first place....

 

[Old Ridge Runner]

So you put the interests of the shareholders above the interests of the employees? And it is OK to shafte the workers out of their benefits in order to give out dividends to the shareholders? Is that your stance?

Yes because the worker receives the benifits of his labor at the time his labor is used. The investor takes a chance and hopes his investment will benifit him somethime in the near future, in that context, the investor interest should laway be considered before that of the workers.

 

[OldGaffer]

Yes because the worker receives the benifits of his labor at the time his labor is used. The investor takes a chance and hopes his investment will benifit him somethime in the near future, in that context, the investor interest should laway be considered before that of the workers.

Not according to the greatest of all the Republican Presidents:

Labor is prior to, and independent of, capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed. Labor is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration.
Abraham Lincoln

Read more: http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/a/abrahamlin395631.html#ixzz1klE67mr4

 

[Old Ridge Runner]

You are 100% right, the union had a legal contract that the company agreed too and signed it. The company required you to this and that and follow these rules. And the company said they would take this part of their money they made and provide these wages and benefits.

A living wage to you ridge is whatever we decide to pay you, and that can change as we see fit. Why would a company not do what they said they would do. I can see them running out of money and closing shop, but that doesn't mean you don't have to pay what you owe, that you saved but now want to say well we need that money back. And going forward we don't want to keep paying what we owe. what we promised.

I wonder what a company would do if they had found out that a group of employee weren't doing the work they were hired for, but was putting their hours in at another job and just stopping back to pick up their checks. You would say this is fraud.

How would you do the work for one company while working for another? That just doesn't jive. However, I will say this, I was a member of a union for 23 years. I also was a a shop steward for ten years and what turned me off to the unions is that when I was called to a greveiance meeting it was alway the same people getting in trouble for the same reasons as the last meeting.

 

[Old Ridge Runner]

Not according to the greatest of all the Republican Presidents:


Read more: http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/a/abrahamlin395631.html#ixzz1klE67mr4

If capital can not exist without labor, than how can a business exist? Capital is needed to start up the business because if the capital did not exist to start the business than the need for the labor in that business would not exist.

 

[OldGaffer]

If capital can not exist without labor, than how can a business exist? Capital is needed to start up the business because if the capital did not exist to start the business than the need for the labor in that business would not exist.

Many businesses have been started by one man and his labor, none have been started by capital and no labor.

 

[NightSwimmer]

Same thing happened to my great-great-grandfather's wagon wheel company. His workers just quit showing up after he stopped paying them. Why, we'd all still be riding around eating our Twinkies in grand horse-drawn carriages were it not for those peon laborers expecting their employer to honor a stupid contract.

You just can't have anything nice around here anymore!

 

[middleview]

So somebody speculating in stock, gambling that the company may do better or worse, is more important than the people who have spent years building the company? I buy a thousand shares of Microsoft this morning and I'm more valuable than the engineers who have worked for years to develop the products and processes that made the stock worth a dime.....

When I bought the stock I didn't buy it from the company. I bought it from some other speculator. The stockholder has no loyalty to the company and hasn't put a nickel into the company, unless they bought that stock in an IPO.

I hope I never have to work for a knucklehead with ideas like yours....

 

[Old Ridge Runner]

And I would hope that I would nevr have to work for a person like you who would permit a union to dismantle a company by outragious wage and benifit demands to the fact that it has to go into bankruptcy or close it doors and all of the people loosing their jobs, and the unon moving on not caring about the fate of its members to distroy yet another company.

 

[middleview]

dismantling a company with their management fees and stripping the company of assets...and then moving on, not caring about the fate of the employees to destroy yet another company.....Bain Capital.

 

[Old Ridge Runner]

dismantling a company with their management fees and stripping the company of assets...and then moving on, not caring about the fate of the employees to destroy yet another company.....Bain Capital.

The only right you have when working for someone or a corporation is the wage that you either negotiated or was told you would be paid when to accepted the job. Again, it is altimately the resonsibility of the individual person and not the compny for that persons health and retirement. That is what you will not address. For some reason it is your opinion that the company should be responsibile for every aspect of the needs of its employees.

 

[middleview]

When the CEO and officers of a corporation run the place as their own personal bank and harem...the employees are in fact looking after their health and retirement by forming unions.

That is what you won't address. Then the employees have some influence over their own work environment and compensation.

It makes no sense to me to think that a company can act as if the employees are an expendable commodity but the shareholders should be treated as if the company exists solely for their benefit. The people who run a publicly traded company should be expected to run the company with the long term health of the company in mind. That means that they must recognize how to motivate employees. Some times that means through pay and benefits....sometimes there are other ways.

I am not arguing that unions should engage in negotiations that ignore the productivity of the workers or the flexibility of the company in using their resources. Unions did a lot of damage to the steel industry and the auto industry as well....You seem to think that those union abuses mean we need to ban unions. The CEO and board of directors at Enron screwed investors, employees and customers....does that mean we should ban CEOs and boards of directors?

 

[Old Ridge Runner]

When the CEO and officers of a corporation run the place as their own personal bank and harem...the employees are in fact looking after their health and retirement by forming unions.

That is what you won't address. Then the employees have some influence over their own work environment and compensation.

It makes no sense to me to think that a company can act as if the employees are an expendable commodity but the shareholders should be treated as if the company exists solely for their benefit. The people who run a publicly traded company should be expected to run the company with the long term health of the company in mind. That means that they must recognize how to motivate employees. Some times that means through pay and benefits....sometimes there are other ways.

I am not arguing that unions should engage in negotiations that ignore the productivity of the workers or the flexibility of the company in using their resources. Unions did a lot of damage to the steel industry and the auto industry as well....You seem to think that those union abuses mean we need to ban unions. The CEO and board of directors at Enron screwed investors, employees and customers....does that mean we should ban CEOs and boards of directors?

I am not suggeting that unions should be banned. What I am saying is when a company gets in trouble (money wise) and goes to the union for concessions to keep the business afloat, than the union has a obligation to do so for the sake of their members. However, it is more the case than not that the unions refuse to give up anything to keep the company up and running. I will also state that the company's management has the same obligation. If management is asking the union to give up certain negoiated entitlements than the management should be willing to give up the same.

On Enron it suggests that the management should have went to prison, their assets and the assets of the company, real and monitary be seiged and divided amoung those affested by what the management did. However, union CEOs seem to be able to walk away from a failed company when the union caused that failure with no reprocussions, now is that fair?