Sunday, November 11, 2012

Papa John's Boycott? WTF?



            You will have to forgive me if this is much shorter than other things I write, I have some serious homework waiting for me.  When I have to choose between my grad school work and making strangers happy, sorry but you are going to lose every time.

            Well anyways liberals are going bat shit crazy; at least on Huffington post from the links I have been given.  Now why are they throwing temper tantrums now?  Well because the CEO of Papa John’s announced that he was going to be cutting back hours in his stores to 28 to avoid Obamacare.  Now before I explain why it is not only silly but destructive for liberals to get their panties in a wad, I had better give a basic lesson in business.

            Please trust me on this information, I am halfway through my MBA and I still have a 4.0, for now at least.  An organization is in business to make money.  They must make a profit to stay in business and to keep investors happy.  Liberals may not care about Wall Street but that is at their peril if they do not respect and understand the forces at work.  Wall Street is not just the rich; it is pension funds and 401k mutual funds that are playing with your money.  The money you have saved for your retirement.  You apply the same sort of pressure on Wall Street when you pick the investment strategy you expect to achieve.  So you are also an investor, not just the 1% that you love to quote so often.  Now if investors are not happy with an organization they have two options, overthrow the board (which takes a lot of effort) or just sell the stock.  Most investors will just sell a stock when they are not happy with the results or the way the organization is being run.  If enough investors abandon the stock, it becomes undervalued.

            Now when a stock is undervalued the organization can become a target for a leveraged buyout.  A leveraged buyout basically uses the collateral of a company to borrow enough money to do a hostile takeover of the organization.  They will restructure it, making it much more profitable and then refloat it on the stock market, making a nice profit in the process.  The people/organizations that do this are considered corporate raiders.  They serve a purpose to keep boards responsible to investors and prevent incompetence within an organization.  Yet when corporate raiders take over a company that is when you see the real nightmare stories of people getting screwed over.  These people have no intention of keeping the organization.  They only want to make it look like a good investment so they can flip their investment quickly.  Much the same as many of you were flipping houses as the real estate market was climbing and climbing.  I hope you understand why it is important to make a profit and keep investors happy.

            Now why is it self-destructive for liberals to have their panties in a wad?  Well for one thing they are persecuting the CEO for saying what many such organizations will be doing.  Maybe he spoke up to calm the fears of investors over costs associated with Obamacare.  Maybe he was trying to let everyone know that this is not a good thing, but he knew he would get no attention if he sat down and gave an interview as to why.  I cannot think of a single liberal that is intelligent to understand that logic, so I will try a different approach.  First thing you are doing is hurting the people at the bottom of the food chain by starting your boycott.  The people that work at a pizzeria are not career delivery drivers, or pizza makers.  If they are doing it full time they are doing whatever it takes to just make ends meet.  By boycotting Papa John’s you are putting many people’s jobs investments and businesses at risk.  You are putting the college student that works less than 20 hours just to cover some living expenses while they go to school at risk.  You are also putting many franchise operations at risk.

            You see not every single Papa John’s store is a corporate store.  There will be large (or even very large) percentages that are franchise stores.  Depending on how the organization is set up distribution may even be franchised out in some areas.  These are people that invested their money (from tens of thousands to a few million for distribution) to use and sell under the Papa John’s logo.  The franchise store owner that only owns one or two stores does not have enough employees to worry about the 50 person requirement of Obamacare.  Yet you will be boycotting them as well.  You also have to realize that the majority of employees that work in fast food are not full time.  Managers of such operations are full time and they are most likely already getting insurance, their status will not change.  Yet you are putting their future at risk with your boycott.  

            You also have to realize that Papa John’s is not just the store you see.  That store you see may have 20 to 30 employees, with only 5 to 7 getting more than 30 hours a week.  Two would be managers and 5 just trying to survive as best they can.  There is also the entire organization that supports the store.  You have a distribution and production chain that are already working full time and those people already have benefits like store managers.  The truck drivers that make deliveries to stores, they also work full time and get benefits.  Regional directors that make less than 100k a year are another group of people that your boycott is targeting.  Corporate headquarters, these people already have benefits, they are professionals.  There are accountants, media experts, MBAs that plan the present and future for the company; all of these people area already full time and getting benefits.  We also cannot forget about all the different organizations that fill orders for Papa John’s, pizza boxes are not made in house.  Everyone will suffer from lower sales.  How many of these people voted for your precious president?  You are going to stab all of them in the back?

            Oh please do it!  I mean that.  Make complete idiots of yourselves.  Force the economy into rapid self-destruction!  My job is secure, my education is my goal, and my country is my religion.  If you fools utterly trash the economy completely to hell, it will only make it easier to achieve what I believe is the right path for the USA.  The only people you will be hurting are those who are already struggling to make ends meet.  You will not hurt me and you will not hurt the CEO of Papa John’s.  Even if you force it into bankruptcy, I really doubt he will go hungry or have to sell his home.  What do you think the result will be for those who are relying on this income during tough economic times?  They will be pushed away from the liberalism you preach, since you are preaching them out of a job!  They will come to my side and they may even learn a few things about how the economy works and become a success in life.  So I wish you all the best in your boycott and all its collective foolishness!