The union certainly had a huge part in the demise of this plant, as it refused to even submit management's several inducement offers to the membership for a vote. Management's offers were wage/benefit cutbacks, but steady work.
Nor did the union appear to try and negotiate a "temporary" wage/benefit rollback until the plant got back on it's feet and then tie wages to profit/productivity. It simply seemed to dig in it's heels and prefer the business going under rather than giving an inch, even though it did allow a reduced workforce to operate for almost a year under the old union contract. As this is a huge union, and this local worker base is small fry, perhaps it felt intransigence would help strengthen their bargaining position elsewhere?
But management is not faultless, either. The new owner was an overseas British Indian who seemed overbearing, inflexible and more interested in turning an immediate profit than looking a few years ahead to reinvigorize the business. Of course, he stood to lose a lot of his initial investment if he failed. He didn't appear to understand either the community nor the American worker. But, the plant needed capital upgrading and investment to stay competitive and he chose to try and take the upgrade money out of the wages side up front.
Everybody lost, except perhaps the Union, which now has demonstrated it's testosterone for future labor negotiations. They didn't give an inch, and they can now prove their toughness drove a company out of business. That should scare some other owners up for contracts! They'll just move their interests on to their Locals in other states.
Meanwhile, the biggest losers were the workers and the community. There's not much farming anymore and even Burger King jobs are scarce. It looks like both parents will again have to work to make skimpy ends meet, just like during the Depression - if they can even find jobs.
Who says history doesn't repeat itself?
First, I would like to state I am not defending unions and am not now nor have I ever been a member. When the plants were closing and moving south, a lot of people cheered because they saw it as the demise of the unions - now many of those people are realizing it is the demise of American manufacturing. We cannot be a nation of consumers - we must have something to sell. The big lie was we would export technology - well guess what, other countries are just as capable of this technology as we are and now we are left with aging or closed manufacturing plants and a whole boatload of illegals that will work for less because they do not have to take care of the basics for themselves.
I talked with a man yesterday that travels abroad for work. He says people in the US just do not realize how other parts of the world are moving forward and America is either staying stagnant or moving backwards. He says many other countries are improving their infrastructure, transportation, manufacturing. In Malaysia, he said their technology was ahead of ours and their cell phones (of recent vintage) was so far behind their system in technology, they were unusable.
My husband talked with a lady last week who had called an insurance company and talked with an Indian - who was living in India!!!!!! Now how can an American worker compete with someone in India. It is just not possible. Think how many times you have called a company and talked with a person who has an accent - is that person in an office in Dallas, Philadelphia, New York, or Pakistan!!!
Now I know some will defend this as 'free trade' and some who are making a living because of this foreign influence. Also I would not be surprised if some will deny this, but can anyone deny that America is aging and sagging because we are not making the strides we should. That is undeniable. The cities are rotting, the taxes are outrageous, and we taxpayers are burdened with the upkeep of millions of illegal immigrants. That is a recipe for disaster.