The Real Twinkies Tragedy

Americans have raided grocery store shelves across the country to stock up on Twinkies, Ding Dongs and Ho Hos now that the 85-year-old manufacturer is in liquidation.

I find it amusing that people are getting so sentimental about a company that promotes junk foods. There is no such outcry when a magazine goes out of business.

Hostess built its trade largely by helping generations of Americans grow fat. There won’t be any shortage of junk food options now that Hostess has gone belly up.

But the real tragedy here is not the demise of Twinkies; it’s the unwillingness of workers to compromise in order to stay employed. Hostess workers went on strike and the company opted to go out of business rather than engage in prolonged negotiations with its bakers’ union.

That means 18,500 more Americans have lost their jobs, in three dozen plants and 565 distribution centers. Food is one of the few commodities that we don’t import en masse from China.

“Our members decided they were not going to take any more abuse from a company they have given so much to for so many years,” Frank Hurt, the bakers’ union president, said Friday.

Those union workers who refused to take pay, health insurance and pension cuts are living in denial. Years into a recession isn’t the time to be demanding more concessions from your employer. It’s hard enough for college graduates to find work today, let alone factory workers.

There isn’t a plentiful choice of any kind of job today, unless you happen to be an airplane pilot or physician. No matter if wages and benefits have been cut, it’s better to keep a job that to force your company into insolvency to prove a point.