(RepublicanNews.org) – The U.S. economy took another massive hit on July 30th with the Yellow Corporation halting all operations in lieu of a reported pending bankruptcy announcement. The company is considered a titan of the American transportation industry and their trucks have been a mainstay on highways since 1929.
The Nashville-based operation has laid off the majority of its 8,000 nonunion employees and told its Teamster-majority workforce not to report for duty. The union has 22,000 members under the Yellow umbrella and its head confirmed their leadership has been notified of the pending filing.
It is unclear when the filing will take place because the company is still reportedly shopping for one of its logistics units to potential buyers. The Teamsters general president said in a statement that news of bankruptcy is “not surprising.”
The company had been heavily leveraged and under financial strain for years. In 2009, Yellow narrowly avoided filing and was pulled back from the brink when Teamsters agreed to wage cuts. Debt maturities and interest payments forced the company to refinance their loans a number of times following the wage-cut agreement with their union workers.
The company accepted a pandemic relief loan of $700 million from the federal government in 2021 while still underwater. $400 million of that amount was spent on equipment upgrades. The remaining $300 million is reported to have been put towards employee health care and pension plans. On July 17th, a delinquency notice was issued for those pensions.
Public rumors of bankruptcy began circulating on social media on July 20th when a video was posted to TikTok that appeared to show a Yellow driver screaming about his pension no longer existing. The video was a clip from an employee meeting in which company workers learned their employer was in severe financial distress. The driver featured in the video was said to have been at the company for over 30 years.
Copyright 2023, RepublicanNews.org
