When I heard someone offered to buy the Sun Times for $5 million, about the going rate for a backup outfielder, I was immediately suspicious.Turns out I had reason to be. From Crain's Chicago...
"“It’s a terrible piece of dung,” Thomas Thibeault, executive director of the Newspaper Guild of Chicago, said of the required concessions. “It guts our contract.” Mr. Tyree (the potential owner) wants to replace the current pension program with a 401(k), cut wages and benefits by 15% over a three-year period and cap severance pay at four weeks. Under the current union contract, some workers qualify for 50 weeks of pay if they involuntarily lose their jobs. “The real killer here is that it is taking away our seniority rights, which basically means you can terminate someone who has been there for 25 years,” Mr. Thibeault said."
On the other hand, the alternative may be having no job at all. It's a lousy time to be working in the media.
