Triumphrat

highcard

Seems like a reasonable response to a dreadful situation. Those unions have more money than God as evidenced by the massive amounts of money that they pour into elections.

This way, they wouldn't even have to negotiate wages and benefits. They would be voted on by the members.

Truly a win-win situation.

BTW, this is NOT a left or right issue, as the Private Equity firms involved in THIS particular instance were democrat affiliated companies backed by Richard Gebhart (a former democrat politician and a current Teamsters lobbyist) and other firms with ties to the democratic party. So, those in the prior pages ranting about the evil right are just setting up a strawman that has no place in this discussion.

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Demonic

I don't think anyone has blamed "The Right". Blaming the vultures, yes, some blaming the Union, but I haven't seen anyone make this a "Left vs Right" issue, until you did. Mention something about strawman?

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Joemomma

That has worked in some cases, but for example, in the case of Triumph, it was ultimately a failure. Financing takeover deals, getting enough financing to cover start up ( or restart/retooling costs ) is best left to people who do that well. It's particularly hard when a company has been poorly managed for a long period of time, and investment hasn't been made in infrastructure or marketing.
Looking out for the benefit of the workers and good management are both requisites for a successful, sustainable business. Trying to turn what is really a partnership into us vs. them rarely works.

edit: Not having the Teamsters, but worker's collectives buying the company.

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highcard

Someone hasn't followed the thread:

The problem is that there is a large demographic that DOES believe what's fed to them by Fox. They are the willfully misinformed who enjoy becoming livid over fiction and behaving as if it were fact.
-Slowpocono

I quoted your post about your belief that one news source sucked. Only your "side" seems to be a reliable news source reported with out opinion.
I truly enjoy reading hypocrisy. No argument, just an observation.
-Hap...in a reply to Slowpocono

Apology accepted.

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highcard

So, if the evil vultures shouldn't be involved, who should?

THAT is why I brought up having the unions finance and own the business...who else is "noble" enough in your opinion?

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highcard

So, who do you suggest taking on this company? I don't know too many philanthropists that would do this out of the kindness of their heart.

Again, the most sensible solution is to quit whining about fat cats and "vultures" and do something constructive like putting their money where their mouths are. That way if it succeeds, all prosper and if they fail, their will be no "evil vultures", "fat cats" or other people to blame.

BTW, the only "us vs. them" that I have heard vocalized is the union calling the investors names.

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Greaser

Anybody who interested in long term ( I mean years if not generations and not just to the end of trading Friday afternoon!) viability of the company where everybody takes a cut and makes money. Companies should not be used as a means to fleece people of money or as pawns in legalized fraud, otherwise known as vulture capitalism.

The company I used to work for Owens-Illinois, closed our plant 4 years ago because at "only $1 million/month NET profit) it wasn't "profitable" enough. Keep in mind we were one plant out of many and we were one of the top money making plants in the organization. They recieved huge tax breaks, write offs and refunds from the Canadian government as a result.

highcard

As mentioned, the Teamsters ALONE would have adequate funding and financing available to do this deal. They pump millions into elections, but when are they going to step up and take control of a company like Hostess to protect their union brothers and sisters?

Maybe it's time for them to stop with the class warfare and actually put their money where their mouth is. I mean REALLY, what do the union leaders do with ALL THAT MONEY? Bargaining isn't that expensive, unless you are wasting money on bloating union leader salaries and elections.

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highcard

OK...so who is this investor?

The one's concerned with long term investment should be the workers via their union investment.

Or are you suggesting the "government" should be the owner of the means of production?

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hlmiskelly

The problem with publicly traded companies, as most large companies are, is that they have become solely measured by quarterly earnings and hitting expected earnings. Not sure how to fix this since there is so much capital that really does not care where it is invested or for how long just so long as the return on investment is high.

Companies that are held by private equity firms, as Hostess is...or was, are - in the best case - interested in making their holdings more valuable and profitable so that they can be sold for much more than bought for or, in the worst case, taking huge management fees out of their holdings by leveraging the assets, declaring bankruptcy when there is no more fees to be had, and then leaving the stripped carcasses to be picked over by the banks, suppliers, and - if they are lucky - the employees and their pension funds.

Some of the best performing companies over the long termare those which are privately held by families. My favorite example is W L Gore. When there is an interest in making sure that a company has value for generations the right behavior is shown by management and workers.

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