No problem there:
mmmmmmm ... expensiv-e-licious
Posted on 06/04/2002 10:04:06 AM PDT by Vladiator
Tuesday June 4, 12:01 pm Eastern Time
Reuters Business Report
Hershey Restarts Plant with Temp Workers
By Cris Foehlinger
HERSHEY, Pa. (Reuters) - Hershey Foods Inc. (NYSE:HSY - News), unable to convince striking workers to accept a new contract calling for an increase in their health care costs, on Tuesday said it restarted production at one of its two shuttered candy plants with temporary workers.
Negotiations aimed at ending a five-week strike at two plants, representing about a fifth of the largest U.S. chocolate maker's total production, broke off early Tuesday after a 21-hour session failed to yield a collective bargaining agreement, company and union officials said.
"This (strike) cannot continue," said Ray Brace, Hershey's vice president of operations and technology, in a statement early Tuesday. "We've now reached the point where important decisions are being made about the future of our business."
Investors have begun to worry that the maker of Kisses, Hershey's bars and other confections will have difficulty meeting production demands as it begins to ramp up for the critical back-to-school and Halloween selling season.
Hershey shares were down $1.78, or nearly 3 percent, at $64.00 on the New York Stock Exchange around midday Tuesday. The stock has fallen more than 5 percent since the strike began.
Hershey and some 2,800 members of Chocolate Workers Local 464 have been at odds over the company's move to double workers' share of health-care benefits to 12 percent.
In its statement Tuesday, Hershey said it had submitted a proposal at the talks which would have reduced the cost of prescription drugs for employees, simplified employee cost sharing on their medical plan and restored retiree medical coverage for some employees.
Union representative Robert Oakley said that the two sides had indeed made significant progress in the all-night talks. The sticking point, he said, remained workers' portion of the health care cost sharing, or so-called co-pay.
"The company wants to continue increasing the co-pays and we told them members wouldn't approve that," Oakley told Reuters. "We're so close to a settlement here. I don't know what more we can do for these people."
Hershey's Brace said that one of the two shuttered facilities, known locally as the Hershey plant, has already come on line. Plans are in the works to restart the other plant, called West Hershey, in coming days, he said.
The plants, which make confections including Hershey's Kisses, Bars and Reese's peanut butter cups, were shut down when the union went on strike April 26.
UNION WITHOUT CONTRACT SINCE NOVEMBER
Striking for the first time in 22 years, the union has been without a contract since its four-year agreement expired on Nov. 4. A unit of the Bakery, Confectionary, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers International, the local returned to the bargaining table with Hershey on Monday morning, its second attempt at federal mediation after a failed attempt on May 16.
"Clearly from Hershey's point of view, they need to get these plants running at typical levels for this period of time in order to meet customer demand in the back half of the year," said Goldman Sachs food analyst Romitha Mally. "I think the (temporary) workers aren't going to be as efficient initially. There's going to be a period where they need to learn the ropes."
Hershey has assured Wall Street analysts it is capable of meeting customers' demands.
But more than most companies in the large-cap food sector, Hershey is a cyclical business, depending on key selling seasons such as the fall, and the Christmas and Easter holidays, when consumers stock up on chocolate and other sweets. (with additional reporting by Deborah Cohen in Chicago)
Oh baloney! You don't know what you're talking about. malpractice suits are not easy to win. Doctors and hospitals tend to act like Catholic priests. Even when they get caught with their pants down, they circle the wagons and protect each other. And start hollering how it ain't their fault. You will understand this if you or someone close to you gets screwed up by a doctor thru negligence. parsy.
Now, having already had this opinion of government unions, and since coming in to contact with the various construction unions, I can only assume that they are all fat and lazy losers whose soul goal in life is to sit around on their asses and then bitch and moan when they are expected to work for their paycheck.
I think I will go and buy a Hershey Bar.
You speak the truth. I don't agree, however, with the phrasing. If 'labor management' weren't so reflexively 'dictatorial and anti-business'; then, business would not be so reflexively anti-labor.IMHO, the 'BIG' problems(or the BIG problem solvers) lie with top management of both the 'white collar and blue collar' workers.
I will agree with your second statement. Each group (as a group) seeks to have government give them what they can not get at the bargaining table. Both are equally guilty of this.
Your first statement is a bit trickier. In order for labor to flourish, they must work for healthy businesses. However, it is not labor's job to compensate for mismanagement of the business. The two sides come together for a mutually beneficial agreement - the contract. The contract contains provisions which are agreeable (in whole) to both sides, albiet not every provision is one that both sides want. Labor wants to build in costs to the business that it converts to benefits. Management wants concessions from labor that it converts to savings. On the whole, the labor contract can not be one which is out of whack with prevailing costs of labor. This is not reflexively 'dictatorial and anti-business'. This is part of doing business.
Each side should be allowed to hammer out an agreement, without gov't intervention. The economic realities should prevail. In the case of Hershey workers, they have to deal with the fact they can be relatively easily replaced before the company goes broke. In the case of an airline and its pilots, the airline has to deal with the fact that labor has the upper hand in negotiations.
This is free-market labor negotiations. Labor consolidates into unions for maximum leverage, and owners consolidate into corporations for maximum leverage. They should let it all hang out and find where they can meet. Brinksmanship breeds agreeable minds on both sides.
No problem there:
mmmmmmm ... expensiv-e-licious
I think in the 'global economy', the 'prevailing costs' of labor are causing a much greater 'rift' than they used to--hence the 'living wage' arguments in America. If we must pay a 'living wage' with benefits here in the USA, we lose our 'entry level'(unskilled) opportunities to produce here in the USA. Our 'prevailing costs' are much too high in light of the current competition. All of us have to have lower costs of production in mind, and must compare our costs in total(incl the health care and other 'bennies') to the totalitarian regimes with which we continue to do business without regard to their 'treatment' of workers.
If we are going to pay the price of goods 'Made in China' and 'Assembled in Mexico', we have to produce at that price if we want to make them here. A 'competitive difference' in wage and costs is acceptable, non-competitive differences drive business away.
Thank you for your detailed response, I think we could work out a contract, unless our 'bosses' MANDATED positions from which we could not negotiate.
I know that 30 people lost their jobs because 21 other people filed 'fraudulent' injury claims, and nobody got significant $$$$ other than lawyers(ambulance chasers)
'Bad law' is expensive law, and it is not the answer to the real 'malpractice' case that strikes close to home.
'Doctor terrorists' are no easier to stop than Al-Queda ones--we've got to STOP them from getting to a point where they can do damage.
Other malpractice is simply mistakes and negligence and not the result of bad training. Some doctors might try to schedule more surgeries in one day than they should to make some extra money. Again, they bet on the odds of not having anything major happen.
More malpractice goes "un-sued" than gets sued. parsy
And, if I remember correctly, self-employed people pay ALL of their Social Security, not just 7.5 percent. I get a bit upset at those who think that an employer owes them anything but what that employer is willing to pay and they are willing to accept. No more--no less.
LOL, I also display photos of conservatives just to tweak the liberals.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.