Hundreds of people lost their jobs when Hostess, then in bankruptcy proceedings, closed the plant in Emporia last November following a strike by union bakers:
The Hostess closing left 18,000 people out of work across the country—with about 5,000 of those union members. Hiring in remodeled plants is underway. …
“The Hostess strike will be a lasting image and not for the good of unions,” said Marc Bloch, a labor and employment lawyer at Walter & Haverfield.
“I think any management team will hold up a photo to its workers of Hostess strikers and say, ‘What’s a union going to do for you?”’ Bloch said. “The case can be made that they did nothing.” …
Only 14.3 million of all workers in the U.S. currently belong to unions, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics—just 11.3 percent of the total workforce. That’s the lowest rate in 70 years. The peak for union workers was a 35 percent rate during the mid-1950s, after a surge in unionization during the Great Depression through post-World War II.
