America’s Future Tomorrow, Today, But With Twinkies!

By John Hawkins
TPNN Contributor

Get used to stories like this one because you’re going to see a lot of them in the coming years.

Hostess Brands permanently closed three bakeries Monday, including a plant in St. Louis where 365 jobs were cut, in response to a bakers’ union strike that started Friday.

The bankrupt maker of Twinkies and Wonder bread said it’s trying to avert liquidating the entire company, and it shuttered three plants that were no longer able to produce and deliver products because of picket lines. The other plant closures are in Seattle and Cincinnati, where a combined 262 jobs were cut.

“We deeply regret this decision, but we have repeatedly explained that we will close facilities that are no longer able to produce and deliver products because of a work stoppage — and that we will close the entire company if widespread strikes cripple our business,” Hostess CEO Gregory Rayburn said in a statement.

Wholesale baker Hostess Brands, which is based in Irving, Texas, filed for bankruptcy in January and has fought with labor groups over contract changes throughout the year.

Contrary to what you may infer from listening to Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, and Barack Obama, businesses are not piggy banks that solely exist to keep people employed and pay taxes. They also don’t spring up like mushrooms after a hard rain just because the government builds a few roads and puts some stop signs in place.

To the contrary, businesses exist to make a profit. When that no longer becomes possible because of a changing marketplace or alternately, because of rising labor costs, exorbitant taxes, or new regulations, then the jobs go away, too.

When you disconnect from reality, as the bakers’ union did, and start to assume businesses are there to serve you instead of making a profit, you see what results. When the Democratic Party makes the same mistake and starts disconnecting its policy making from the profits and productivity that allows the government to pay its bills, it means less jobs, less opportunity, and more foolish people protesting themselves right out of a job.