All of me... (work - just past)

So, below I just mentioned the cutting of our retirement benefits. Here is something I did (along with another work mate) to try and stir things up about that.

We received a meeting notice for the whole plant to get together and talk about our 2nd quarter results. Before the meeting we were all given chances to forward off questions. Three of these questions would be chosen and read out during the meeting. So, my bud and I decided we would each send in pretty much the same question, thinking that if we both sent it perhaps it would actually get read.

Well it was read out.. here is the question I sent to them:

Why were our retirement benefits cut? What are the exact savings to the company in dollars? And, what new incentive will there be for workers to wish to stay at ****** rather than looking elsewhere before we get to retirement? In other words what is there to look forward to in terms of a long-term career goal here.

This is a question that needs some direct and open talk and we would appreciate your answers, thank you.

This was his response:

Wow, that's a ... good question. Hmm. The savings on retirement benefits were considerable. These savings were applied to what we offer our customer. We benchmarked what our company offered against what other companies offer and found we could make this cut. This puts us in the 52 percentile. As for why you should stay here. Well, we still offer an employee share program and a bonus system.

A couple of explanations:

1. This question was read in 6 other meetings previous to mine. Yet he still pulled it off as if this was the first time he had read it.

2. Our stock used to be around $80 a share and is now hovering just above $10. This is no longer looked at as a benefit to most workers and is not used like it was in the past.

3. The bonus system has only paid off twice in the last five years and the 2nd time it was so small people actually laughed. Either way it is not enough to replace retirement benefits.

Another bud here asked a question. They always try to be the world leader in our type of manufacturing. They always ask us to give 110% even during restructuring to help "grow" our company and "keep" business here. (As if our wages have nothing to do with it.) So why are they so happy to point out that our of 100 companies say we are 48th in benefits? (The 52 percentile number)