Capitalism

It is a major part of the Republican agenda - we need to put most of our faith in capitalism and the big industries that result because government is so bad. We hear this repeatedly - the marketplace will punish the bad businesses, but there is no way to punish government ( of course there is - we can sue for redress of our grievances and we can vote politicians out of office).

But, as one of the little guys ( and I am one of them), please don't EVER underestimate the evil that big corporations can foist upon you. We need strong government to protect us. But sadly, here is one case where they haven't protected the people. Both capitalism and government failed us.

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Source...

Of all the outrages Hostess has committed against its workers, this may take the cake. In August, 2011, the company just stopped contributing to its workers' pensions, and is now acknowledging that it instead used the money for operational expenses. The money that didn't go into pension funds was money that the workers had bargained for and chosen to take as pension instead of wages. But that doesn't mean there's anything they can do about it:

The maneuver probably doesn't violate federal law because the money Hostess failed to put into the pension didn't come directly from employees, experts said."It's what lawyers call betrayal without remedy," said James P. Baker, a partner at Baker & McKenzie LLP who specializes in employee benefits and isn't involved in the Hostess case. "It's sad, but that stuff does happen, unfortunately."