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Unions Shut Down Hostess

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Re: Unions Shut Down Hostess

Postby Juan_Bottom on Sun Nov 18, 2012 7:45 pm

patches70 wrote:Because conditions are different now than when unions began forming.

That's the point I'm making, changing conditions always require changing responses. Unions are slow to change, are they not?

No, That's far to general. Unions are quick to change. That is why they have all been agreeing to pay and benefits cuts for their members since the financial collapse.
Conditions are different today than they were yesterday, so that's not saying anything. The only thing that's truly changed is the people's mindset. Unions appeared in a flash of a few years, and big business has been fighting a propaganda campaign ever since. And they're winning. But we've obviously returned to the same worker/employer disparity that we had in the 1900s that brought about Unions in the first place. We're talking about a large company that tried to force it's workers to give up their earned pay so that the managers could get bigger raises.

America is a Union, and we still exist, even though conditions have changed.

I disagree with your peak timeline, and Unions have grown since then in other country which are technologically and financially sound. Germany has a stronger Union membership than the US, Canada has more than double the members the US has, and most Finnish workers are in a Union.
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Re: Unions Shut Down Hostess

Postby Evil Semp on Sun Nov 18, 2012 7:55 pm

Phatscotty wrote:
Phatscotty wrote:
Evil Semp wrote:Here is the article posted earlier about the pay increases for management. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/11/1 ... 47043.html


Phatscotty wrote:Well, in all honesty, the union employees could have taken one for the team, right?


As far as taking one for the team. When management receives the same compensation package [insurance, stock options, vacation, etc, etc] as the workers then the workers might have been more willing to take the pay cuts. Yeah management took a pay cut but after the raises they received they could afford it.


ty


wait a sec. Are you saying that the top management level should have the same compensation as the minimum wage/no skill level positions? I don't think that will ever happen, not even in a Marxist Utopia


I agree it will never happen. If I was a member of that union and management took the same compensation package that I was getting it would convince me that they were willing to "take one for the team.". If rank and file members can live on their pay after the cuts why can't management?

Phatscotty wrote:whether or not they can afford it, I don't see how you could possibly have any information knowing if that is true or not.


I don't know if they can afford it anymore than you can expect the rank and file to live on reduced wages. If members of management can't survive or afford to live on what their employees make maybe you can introduce them to some of the people you know.

Phatscotty wrote:Also, i know people who make it a point to make less than 16k a year and goes on cruises, has a twice a week casino addiction, a flat screen in every room, and when she buys her kids a game for PS3, she gets 2 copies of the same game, so they don't have to share. So that's 16k..... you are way off about 28k barely covering the cost of living.
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Re: Unions Shut Down Hostess

Postby patches70 on Sun Nov 18, 2012 8:14 pm

Juan_Bottom wrote:No, That's far to general. Unions are quick to change. That is why they have all been agreeing to pay and benefits cuts for their members since the financial collapse.
Conditions are different today than they were yesterday, so that's not saying anything. The only thing that's truly changed is the people's mindset. Unions appeared in a flash of a few years, and big business has been fighting a propaganda campaign ever since. And they're winning.


The evil plot, then is it? There is a much more logical reason, just see below.

Juan wrote: But we've obviously returned to the same worker/employer disparity that we had in the 1900s that brought about Unions in the first place.


Yes, we are as bad off as people were in the 1900's. :roll:

You don't think it has anything to do with the plunging value of the dollar, do you? Scratch that, don't answer, you wouldn't make any sense anyway.

Juan wrote: We're talking about a large company that tried to force it's workers to give up their earned pay so that the managers could get bigger raises.


If we are talking about Hostess, then why are you bringing up-
Juan wrote:Germany has a stronger Union membership than the US, Canada has more than double the members the US has, and most Finnish workers are in a Union.


Try to stay on subject. Who cares what the managers got? There is another reason, a much more simple reason Hostess went out of business, just read on.

Juan wrote:America is a Union, and we still exist, even though conditions have changed.


And you believe that will never change?

juan wrote:I disagree with your peak timeline, and Unions have grown since then in other country which are technologically and financially sound. Germany has a stronger Union membership than the US, Canada has more than double the members the US has, and most Finnish workers are in a Union.


Now you know full well that I was talking about US labor unions. Are you trying to say that US labor unions are growing? Because the facts don't support that.

What does the union membership of Germany and what ever other nations you want to list have to do with the poor bastards who were working at Hostess?
Not a damn thing.
Again, try to stay on topic.


It's all the same with you demagogues, always have to cast someone as the villain. When are you ever going to grow up? A business went under. It happens. It's like a messy divorce in a lot of ways. But if the parties involved are wise, then in the long run they'll be better off.
Of course it stings right now. Especially for the workers who walked off the job. Sure they had their reasons, so what? The company is being liquidated, they lost their jobs. Is anyone saying that these workers didn't know this could happen? If so, the naive nature of people is quite telling.

Now, the real reason Hostess went under-
When I was a kid all we ever had was Hostess products. Guess what? Hostess products now are crap. Wonder Bread is nasty, twinkies suck, every product they created was just terrible. I didn't spend a single cent on Hostess products, for decades.

If you want someone to blame, blame people like me. I think Hostess sucked and refused to buy their products. I myself had more to do with all those people losing their jobs than anything else. And guess what? That's the nature of business. Should I have spent my hard earned money buying something I hate just so someone can keep their job?
Screw that.
Make a better product and thrive. Make crap and go out of business. Screw the workers, the managers, the whole company. They made crap. And that's the reason Hostess is gone now. Because people like me found other products that we liked much better and we found to be a better value.

You talk about worker disparity and all that jazz and ignore that large swaths of the consumer gave the thumbs down to Hostess. So tell me, how much money should a person get paid to produce an inferior product?

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Re: Unions Shut Down Hostess

Postby Phatscotty on Sun Nov 18, 2012 8:46 pm

Evil Semp wrote:
Phatscotty wrote:
Phatscotty wrote:
Evil Semp wrote:Here is the article posted earlier about the pay increases for management. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/11/1 ... 47043.html


Phatscotty wrote:Well, in all honesty, the union employees could have taken one for the team, right?


As far as taking one for the team. When management receives the same compensation package [insurance, stock options, vacation, etc, etc] as the workers then the workers might have been more willing to take the pay cuts. Yeah management took a pay cut but after the raises they received they could afford it.


ty


wait a sec. Are you saying that the top management level should have the same compensation as the minimum wage/no skill level positions? I don't think that will ever happen, not even in a Marxist Utopia


I agree it will never happen. If I was a member of that union and management took the same compensation package that I was getting it would convince me that they were willing to "take one for the team.". If rank and file members can live on their pay after the cuts why can't management?

Phatscotty wrote:whether or not they can afford it, I don't see how you could possibly have any information knowing if that is true or not.


I don't know if they can afford it anymore than you can expect the rank and file to live on reduced wages. If members of management can't survive or afford to live on what their employees make maybe you can introduce them to some of the people you know.


#1 good point
#2 I know that earning a wage is better than being unemployed. I also know that what people say they can and can't afford is highly subjective and usually based on lifestyle and comfort levels. (excluding minimum wage/no skill jobs)

Also, if management level employees are going to have to get the same benefit packages or salary as their employees under them, then they are going to have the shittiest management in the world. Nobody will want to do that job when they can do less/stress less/work fewer hours.put in less effort for the same pay, and the company probably would have never got off the ground in the first place.
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Re: Unions Shut Down Hostess

Postby GreecePwns on Sun Nov 18, 2012 8:53 pm

I wouldn't argue them making the same wages as much as I would argue them taking the same percent pay cuts (instead of increasing their salaries several times over).
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Re: Unions Shut Down Hostess

Postby Phatscotty on Sun Nov 18, 2012 8:54 pm

GreecePwns wrote:I wouldn't argue them making the same wages as much as I would argue them taking the same percent pay cuts.


That's fair
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Re: Unions Shut Down Hostess

Postby Evil Semp on Sun Nov 18, 2012 9:23 pm

Phatscotty wrote:#1 good point
#2 I know that earning a wage is better than being unemployed. I also know that what people say they can and can't afford is highly subjective and usually based on lifestyle and comfort levels. (excluding minimum wage/no skill jobs)

Also, if management level employees are going to have to get the same benefit packages or salary as their employees under them, then they are going to have the shittiest management in the world. Nobody will want to do that job when they can do less/stress less/work fewer hours.put in less effort for the same pay, and the company probably would have never got off the ground in the first place.


I think in this case the "shittiest management in the world" is quite appropriate. Ultimately I think any company going out of business is mismanagement. From picking the wrong product to sell, marketing or hiring the wrong employees. All these are management decisions.

In my opinion I think it was mismanagement that caused this company to go under. I don't think their product is inferior product. I can't really tell the difference from a Little Debbie "Twinkie" or a Hostess Twinkie. Marketing the product is what I think the problem was. You don't see Hostess products in Dollar General or Family Dollar stores just to name some of the stores that sell like products.
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Re: Unions Shut Down Hostess

Postby Phatscotty on Sun Nov 18, 2012 9:38 pm

Evil Semp wrote:
Phatscotty wrote:#1 good point
#2 I know that earning a wage is better than being unemployed. I also know that what people say they can and can't afford is highly subjective and usually based on lifestyle and comfort levels. (excluding minimum wage/no skill jobs)

Also, if management level employees are going to have to get the same benefit packages or salary as their employees under them, then they are going to have the shittiest management in the world. Nobody will want to do that job when they can do less/stress less/work fewer hours.put in less effort for the same pay, and the company probably would have never got off the ground in the first place.


I think in this case the "shittiest management in the world" is quite appropriate. Ultimately I think any company going out of business is mismanagement. From picking the wrong product to sell, marketing or hiring the wrong employees. All these are management decisions.

In my opinion I think it was mismanagement that caused this company to go under. I don't think their product is inferior product. I can't really tell the difference from a Little Debbie "Twinkie" or a Hostess Twinkie. Marketing the product is what I think the problem was. You don't see Hostess products in Dollar General or Family Dollar stores just to name some of the stores that sell like products.


Obviously the management had problems, I'm just trying to understand the workers situation (not feelings based). However, the shitty economy seems to be getting a pass here (cept for Patches posts that cover almost everything), as we are seeing post Obama election (all of a sudden first time unemployment applicants jumps to over 400,000!) and then there is globalization.

One thing I do know, is that if the workers said "yes" they would still have their jobs. Not getting into how shitty it is that the decision is placed on their laps, or that the decision is shitty no matter what, but I don't see a reversal in any of the reasons why wages continue to drop or America becoming less competitive in general.

And how much does the new costs coming with Obamacare factor into this? Rising taxes? The coming fiscal cliff Obama gets to drive us over? How much was the cost of regulations to Hostess?

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Re: Unions Shut Down Hostess

Postby Phatscotty on Sun Nov 18, 2012 9:59 pm

Evil Semp wrote:Here is the article posted earlier about the pay increases for management. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/11/1 ... 47043.html


btw, this link has been "corrected" At first I was just going to point out that these management pay raises were "claims" from the union, but it doesn't matter anymore anyways...

An earlier version of as well as an earlier headline of this post incorrectly stated that Greg Rayburn received a 300 percent raise as CEO of Hostess as the company approached bankruptcy. Rayburn wasn't CEO of Hostess until after the company filed for bankruptcy. The post also incorrectly stated that he was paid a salary of up to $2,550,000 per year. His salary when he joined the company was $100,000 per month, according to a company spokesman.


also of note

Hostess’ creditors accused the company in April of manipulating executive salaries with the aim of getting around bankruptcy compensation rules, the Wall Street Journal reported at the time. In response, Rayburn announced he would cut his pay and that of other executives to $1 until Dec. 31 or whenever Hostess came out of bankruptcy.


I bet this won't matter though. The incorrect information has been corrected, but the opinions of posters that have been strongly shaped based solely on the size of the pay raises and salaries for the CEO and management will probably stay the same...

:(
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Re: Unions Shut Down Hostess

Postby Evil Semp on Sun Nov 18, 2012 10:35 pm

Phatscotty wrote:
Evil Semp wrote:Here is the article posted earlier about the pay increases for management. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/11/1 ... 47043.html


btw, this link has been "corrected" At first I was just going to point out that these management pay raises were "claims" from the union, but it doesn't matter anymore anyways...


Yes it does matter. It could explain part of the reason why the employees would accept the pay cuts.

Phatscotty wrote:
An earlier version of as well as an earlier headline of this post incorrectly stated that Greg Rayburn received a 300 percent raise as CEO of Hostess as the company approached bankruptcy. Rayburn wasn't CEO of Hostess until after the company filed for bankruptcy. The post also incorrectly stated that he was paid a salary of up to $2,550,000 per year. His salary when he joined the company was $100,000 per month, according to a company spokesman.


The name given was wrong but that doesn't change the fact about the pay increases or at least the attempt at the pay increases.

Hostess’ creditors accused the company in April of manipulating executive salaries with the aim of getting around bankruptcy compensation rules, the Wall Street Journal reported at the time. In response, Rayburn announced he would cut his pay and that of other executives to $1 until Dec. 31 or whenever Hostess came out of bankruptcy.


Phatscotty wrote:I bet this won't matter though. The incorrect information has been corrected, but the opinions of posters that have been strongly shaped based solely on the size of the pay raises and salaries for the CEO and management will probably stay the same...


Actually it does matter. It show me that he might have taken one for the team but we don't know about his whole pay and compensation package.

Here is an article explaining the CEO changes at Hostess. http://blogs.wsj.com/deals/2012/03/09/h ... as-sought/
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Re: Unions Shut Down Hostess

Postby Phatscotty on Sun Nov 18, 2012 11:17 pm

Evil Semp wrote:
Phatscotty wrote:
Evil Semp wrote:Here is the article posted earlier about the pay increases for management. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/11/1 ... 47043.html


btw, this link has been "corrected" At first I was just going to point out that these management pay raises were "claims" from the union, but it doesn't matter anymore anyways...


Yes it does matter. It could explain part of the reason why the employees would accept the pay cuts.

Phatscotty wrote:
An earlier version of as well as an earlier headline of this post incorrectly stated that Greg Rayburn received a 300 percent raise as CEO of Hostess as the company approached bankruptcy. Rayburn wasn't CEO of Hostess until after the company filed for bankruptcy. The post also incorrectly stated that he was paid a salary of up to $2,550,000 per year. His salary when he joined the company was $100,000 per month, according to a company spokesman.


The name given was wrong but that doesn't change the fact about the pay increases or at least the attempt at the pay increases.

Hostess’ creditors accused the company in April of manipulating executive salaries with the aim of getting around bankruptcy compensation rules, the Wall Street Journal reported at the time. In response, Rayburn announced he would cut his pay and that of other executives to $1 until Dec. 31 or whenever Hostess came out of bankruptcy.


Phatscotty wrote:I bet this won't matter though. The incorrect information has been corrected, but the opinions of posters that have been strongly shaped based solely on the size of the pay raises and salaries for the CEO and management will probably stay the same...


Actually it does matter. It show me that he might have taken one for the team but we don't know about his whole pay and compensation package.

Here is an article explaining the CEO changes at Hostess. http://blogs.wsj.com/deals/2012/03/09/h ... as-sought/


ty again for the link. I am eating them up like candy!

However, it does show he certainly did his part, basically taking a 99.9% pay cut on his standard salary. If that isn't good enough, then I'm not sure if anything would have been good enough. He not only took one for the team, he sacrificed so that there was still a "team" at all. He's probably pretty pissed now that after what he gave up to keep the company going and keep the workers working, and they just walked out on the company. I'm more pissed at the employees now too.

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Re: Unions Shut Down Hostess

Postby Phatscotty on Sun Nov 18, 2012 11:24 pm

Wasn't the salary wrong as well? It used to say 2.5 mil, but it was really only 1.2

yeah, I don't get the point of your second link either. The title is "Hostess CEO Out a Month After Lucrative Payday Was Sought"

Okay, so a guy tried to negotiate a good salary for himself? It's not like he even got it, it was simply "sought". And 1.5 million doesn't really sound that lucrative to me. Actually sounds kind of low.....

Anyways, what is the point of that article? All I get from it is more lusting against "the rich" and that the a new CEO was named, but we already knew that
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Re: Unions Shut Down Hostess

Postby AAFitz on Mon Nov 19, 2012 8:05 am

Phatscotty wrote:
Evil Semp wrote:
Phatscotty wrote:#1 good point
#2 I know that earning a wage is better than being unemployed. I also know that what people say they can and can't afford is highly subjective and usually based on lifestyle and comfort levels. (excluding minimum wage/no skill jobs)

Also, if management level employees are going to have to get the same benefit packages or salary as their employees under them, then they are going to have the shittiest management in the world. Nobody will want to do that job when they can do less/stress less/work fewer hours.put in less effort for the same pay, and the company probably would have never got off the ground in the first place.


I think in this case the "shittiest management in the world" is quite appropriate. Ultimately I think any company going out of business is mismanagement. From picking the wrong product to sell, marketing or hiring the wrong employees. All these are management decisions.

In my opinion I think it was mismanagement that caused this company to go under. I don't think their product is inferior product. I can't really tell the difference from a Little Debbie "Twinkie" or a Hostess Twinkie. Marketing the product is what I think the problem was. You don't see Hostess products in Dollar General or Family Dollar stores just to name some of the stores that sell like products.


Obviously the management had problems, I'm just trying to understand the workers situation (not feelings based). However, the shitty economy seems to be getting a pass here (cept for Patches posts that cover almost everything), as we are seeing post Obama election (all of a sudden first time unemployment applicants jumps to over 400,000!) and then there is globalization.

One thing I do know, is that if the workers said "yes" they would still have their jobs. Not getting into how shitty it is that the decision is placed on their laps, or that the decision is shitty no matter what, but I don't see a reversal in any of the reasons why wages continue to drop or America becoming less competitive in general.

And how much does the new costs coming with Obamacare factor into this? Rising taxes? The coming fiscal cliff Obama gets to drive us over? How much was the cost of regulations to Hostess?

Uncertainty is the worst peace time environment for business operation.


Honestly, I'm surprised you're not just blaming the damn liberals and progressives for blocking schools from serving the crap they made in schools.

In any case, its just speculative to assume the workers knew the company would go under if they went on strike and since they were seeing their management give themselves raises, perhaps they had no reason to make such an assumption. Certainly better management, could have managed the situation better, but hey, that is capitalism. The workers were negotiating, and took some risks, and they didn't pan out as expected. Its the same exact thing you usually defend, but you're a classist when it comes to workers, and you think they should just be the diligent slaves you consider them, and give up their rights to improve their lives.

I have to essentially negotiate my salary with every estimate I give. Its incredibly tough. I have to weigh getting the job vs working for too little, and I have absolutely learned that very often, it is worse to be working for too little, than scrambling to find a better opportunity to work for more money. If every worker ever just stayed content in their position, and their salary rate, there would never be any progress whatsoever. The reality in this situation, was that Hostess was clearly doomed to failure, for a variety of reasons, and now the workers are free to move on to more enterprising jobs elsewhere if they are diligent or lucky enough to do so. And, working for less money, very much would probably not have been in their best interest for the large majority, so as I say again, your views that they should have just done it, is on a very basic level, a communist one, not a capitalist one, Pinkoscotty.
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Re: Unions Shut Down Hostess

Postby AAFitz on Mon Nov 19, 2012 8:15 am

Phatscotty wrote:#2 I know that earning a wage is better than being unemployed.


You know it, but you obviously have not factored in opportunity cost, so saying that earning a wage is always better than being employed, is arguably the stupidest statement you've ever made.

Ask anyone running a business if its more of a risk to lose a job, or work for too little. Getting work is easy, its getting enough to survive that's the trick, and if you work for too little, you wont be working for long anyways. And obviously its not a simple equation, because certainly taking a pay cut is sometimes the better of too options, but its the fact that it is a complicated equation, and why your statement isn't worth of a 6th grade business class.
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Re: Unions Shut Down Hostess

Postby AAFitz on Mon Nov 19, 2012 8:21 am

Phatscotty wrote:Wasn't the salary wrong as well? It used to say 2.5 mil, but it was really only 1.2

yeah, I don't get the point of your second link either. The title is "Hostess CEO Out a Month After Lucrative Payday Was Sought"

Okay, so a guy tried to negotiate a good salary for himself? It's not like he even got it, it was simply "sought". And 1.5 million doesn't really sound that lucrative to me. Actually sounds kind of low.....

Anyways, what is the point of that article? All I get from it is more lusting against "the rich" and that the a new CEO was named, but we already knew that


And now you think 1.5 Million doesn't sound that lucrative for a CEO that obviously led a company into failure. Let me guess...you work for the government, don't you? :lol: :lol: :lol:
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Re: Unions Shut Down Hostess

Postby Evil Semp on Mon Nov 19, 2012 6:04 pm

Phatscotty wrote:Wasn't the salary wrong as well? It used to say 2.5 mil, but it was really only 1.2

yeah, I don't get the point of your second link either. The title is "Hostess CEO Out a Month After Lucrative Payday Was Sought"

Okay, so a guy tried to negotiate a good salary for himself? It's not like he even got it, it was simply "sought". And 1.5 million doesn't really sound that lucrative to me. Actually sounds kind of low.....

Anyways, what is the point of that article? All I get from it is more lusting against "the rich" and that the a new CEO was named, but we already knew that


That article was showing that it wasn't the current CEO who was seeking the pay raise.
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Re: Unions Shut Down Hostess

Postby Phatscotty on Mon Nov 19, 2012 6:10 pm

AAFitz wrote:
Phatscotty wrote:Wasn't the salary wrong as well? It used to say 2.5 mil, but it was really only 1.2

yeah, I don't get the point of your second link either. The title is "Hostess CEO Out a Month After Lucrative Payday Was Sought"

Okay, so a guy tried to negotiate a good salary for himself? It's not like he even got it, it was simply "sought". And 1.5 million doesn't really sound that lucrative to me. Actually sounds kind of low.....

Anyways, what is the point of that article? All I get from it is more lusting against "the rich" and that the a new CEO was named, but we already knew that


And now you think 1.5 Million doesn't sound that lucrative for a CEO that obviously led a company into failure. Let me guess...you work for the government, don't you? :lol: :lol: :lol:


Saying what is and isn't lucrative is obviously your job.


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Re: Unions Shut Down Hostess

Postby Phatscotty on Mon Nov 19, 2012 6:17 pm

GreecePwns wrote:
Of course, this conversation wouldn't be happening if the workers were the management.


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Re: Unions Shut Down Hostess

Postby Iliad on Mon Nov 19, 2012 8:22 pm

Phatscotty wrote:
Evil Semp wrote:
Phatscotty wrote:
Evil Semp wrote:Here is the article posted earlier about the pay increases for management. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/11/1 ... 47043.html


btw, this link has been "corrected" At first I was just going to point out that these management pay raises were "claims" from the union, but it doesn't matter anymore anyways...


Yes it does matter. It could explain part of the reason why the employees would accept the pay cuts.

Phatscotty wrote:
An earlier version of as well as an earlier headline of this post incorrectly stated that Greg Rayburn received a 300 percent raise as CEO of Hostess as the company approached bankruptcy. Rayburn wasn't CEO of Hostess until after the company filed for bankruptcy. The post also incorrectly stated that he was paid a salary of up to $2,550,000 per year. His salary when he joined the company was $100,000 per month, according to a company spokesman.


The name given was wrong but that doesn't change the fact about the pay increases or at least the attempt at the pay increases.

Hostess’ creditors accused the company in April of manipulating executive salaries with the aim of getting around bankruptcy compensation rules, the Wall Street Journal reported at the time. In response, Rayburn announced he would cut his pay and that of other executives to $1 until Dec. 31 or whenever Hostess came out of bankruptcy.


Phatscotty wrote:I bet this won't matter though. The incorrect information has been corrected, but the opinions of posters that have been strongly shaped based solely on the size of the pay raises and salaries for the CEO and management will probably stay the same...


Actually it does matter. It show me that he might have taken one for the team but we don't know about his whole pay and compensation package.

Here is an article explaining the CEO changes at Hostess. http://blogs.wsj.com/deals/2012/03/09/h ... as-sought/


ty again for the link. I am eating them up like candy!

However, it does show he certainly did his part, basically taking a 99.9% pay cut on his standard salary. If that isn't good enough, then I'm not sure if anything would have been good enough. He not only took one for the team, he sacrificed so that there was still a "team" at all. He's probably pretty pissed now that after what he gave up to keep the company going and keep the workers working, and they just walked out on the company. I'm more pissed at the employees now too.

Let me read your link


Why are you pissed off at the employees? Why is this an emotional event at all?

Isn't this your fabled free market at work? A company can't operate unless it pays its employees below market rate wages.
Clearly it's inefficient relative to its competitors if it can't maintain a profit and pay its employees the market rate for their wages, so by going bankrupt it's opening up market space for its more efficient competitors. Its employees, as rational self-interested individuals, as all are in an economist framework, have no interest in sacrificing their own wages to perpetuate inefficiency. If a company can't pay its employees the average market rate wages and maintain a profit, then i don't see why it should be in business.

Why is it, when tax hikes are proposed, even by 1 or 2% the lovely business owners can threaten to flee and relocate and this is celebrated as the 'market' in action, but apparently employees are supposed to accept a 5% pay cut just after concessions two years ago. Like their jobs are some kind of gift bestowed on them and their rational self-interest is not at stake.

You make for a shitty economist if you can't even adhere to your own ideology and just blindly shit on the poorer side in an argument.
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Re: Unions Shut Down Hostess

Postby HapSmo19 on Mon Nov 19, 2012 10:22 pm

Is there some sort of law preventing the union from buying Hostess and paying all these twinkie-rollers a quarter-mil/yr. now or would my suspicicions of that suddenly being the last fucking place on earth these people would want to work be correct?
Sounds like a large union. I'd like to see 'em put their money where their mouth('s) is(are).
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Re: Unions Shut Down Hostess

Postby HapSmo19 on Mon Nov 19, 2012 10:37 pm

And another thing,...

I had the same thought as NS's OP when I first heard about this.
If I walked out of my job and said "I'll be back when you give me a $5/hr. raise, I'd most likely be fired and unemployment would consider it a "quit/no benefits". How the f*ck do these people get a dime of taxpayer money for quitting their job(sorry, no time to read pages 2-9)?
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Re: Unions Shut Down Hostess

Postby aad0906 on Mon Nov 19, 2012 11:20 pm

HapSmo19 wrote:And another thing,...

I had the same thought as NS's OP when I first heard about this.
If I walked out of my job and said "I'll be back when you give me a $5/hr. raise, I'd most likely be fired and unemployment would consider it a "quit/no benefits". How the f*ck do these people get a dime of taxpayer money for quitting their job(sorry, no time to read pages 2-9)?



They didn't. 2 years ago management (after having rejected takeover bids) asked them to accept a wage cut and a pension cut to help save the company $110 million. The employees said yes. Then management gave themselves an 80% raise and the CEO a $1.25 million bonus (he eventually resigned). But the company continues to be in trouble due to falling sales and lack of innovation couple with sky high interest on Private Equity injected SECURED loans. This time the employees said no to yet another wage & pension cut.

Would you walk out of your job if you boss said you have to work for $5 less per hour?
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Re: Unions Shut Down Hostess

Postby Phatscotty on Tue Nov 20, 2012 6:16 am

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/report- ... n-avoided/

Hostess & Union Agree to Mediation, Company Shutdown Temporarily Avoided
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Re: Unions Shut Down Hostess

Postby Phatscotty on Tue Nov 20, 2012 6:21 am

AAFitz wrote:
Phatscotty wrote:
Evil Semp wrote:
Phatscotty wrote:#1 good point
#2 I know that earning a wage is better than being unemployed. I also know that what people say they can and can't afford is highly subjective and usually based on lifestyle and comfort levels. (excluding minimum wage/no skill jobs)

Also, if management level employees are going to have to get the same benefit packages or salary as their employees under them, then they are going to have the shittiest management in the world. Nobody will want to do that job when they can do less/stress less/work fewer hours.put in less effort for the same pay, and the company probably would have never got off the ground in the first place.


I think in this case the "shittiest management in the world" is quite appropriate. Ultimately I think any company going out of business is mismanagement. From picking the wrong product to sell, marketing or hiring the wrong employees. All these are management decisions.

In my opinion I think it was mismanagement that caused this company to go under. I don't think their product is inferior product. I can't really tell the difference from a Little Debbie "Twinkie" or a Hostess Twinkie. Marketing the product is what I think the problem was. You don't see Hostess products in Dollar General or Family Dollar stores just to name some of the stores that sell like products.


Obviously the management had problems, I'm just trying to understand the workers situation (not feelings based). However, the shitty economy seems to be getting a pass here (cept for Patches posts that cover almost everything), as we are seeing post Obama election (all of a sudden first time unemployment applicants jumps to over 400,000!) and then there is globalization.

One thing I do know, is that if the workers said "yes" they would still have their jobs. Not getting into how shitty it is that the decision is placed on their laps, or that the decision is shitty no matter what, but I don't see a reversal in any of the reasons why wages continue to drop or America becoming less competitive in general.

And how much does the new costs coming with Obamacare factor into this? Rising taxes? The coming fiscal cliff Obama gets to drive us over? How much was the cost of regulations to Hostess?

Uncertainty is the worst peace time environment for business operation.


Honestly, I'm surprised you're not just blaming the damn liberals and progressives for blocking schools from serving the crap they made in schools.

In any case, its just speculative to assume the workers knew the company would go under if they went on strike and since they were seeing their management give themselves raises, perhaps they had no reason to make such an assumption. Certainly better management, could have managed the situation better, but hey, that is capitalism. The workers were negotiating, and took some risks, and they didn't pan out as expected. Its the same exact thing you usually defend, but you're a classist when it comes to workers, and you think they should just be the diligent slaves you consider them, and give up their rights to improve their lives.

I have to essentially negotiate my salary with every estimate I give. Its incredibly tough. I have to weigh getting the job vs working for too little, and I have absolutely learned that very often, it is worse to be working for too little, than scrambling to find a better opportunity to work for more money. If every worker ever just stayed content in their position, and their salary rate, there would never be any progress whatsoever. The reality in this situation, was that Hostess was clearly doomed to failure, for a variety of reasons, and now the workers are free to move on to more enterprising jobs elsewhere if they are diligent or lucky enough to do so. And, working for less money, very much would probably not have been in their best interest for the large majority, so as I say again, your views that they should have just done it, is on a very basic level,a communist one, not a capitalist one, Pinkoscotty.


I don't think they should have just done it. I said I would have probably just done it.....and immediately started looking for another, better job, and waited until I found on before I quit the previous one

Good post, not much to say about it, except for the employees have always been free to move on to more enterprising jobs elsewhere. They did not need to go on strike and stop operation of the company in order to do that or excersize their Freedom to do that.
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Re: Unions Shut Down Hostess

Postby Dukasaur on Tue Nov 20, 2012 12:24 pm

Phatscotty wrote:http://www.theblaze.com/stories/report-hostess-union-reach-a-deal-shut-down-avoided/

Hostess & Union Agree to Mediation, Company Shutdown Temporarily Avoided

So the thieving pricks on the Management Board will get to keep their stolen millions, while the workers will eventually accept some concession not quite as blatant as the one they rejected. Sad.
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