Incomplete list of publicly announced layoffs & shutdowns:
California: News media in The Golden State are finally starting to question the unAmerican corporate America excuse that there aren’t enough qualified techies in the U.S. for offshoring such jobs to places like India. This after massive layoffs announced over the past few months by California tech companies such as Qualcomm (who refuses to give exact layoff numbers).
Illinois: Deerfield based but Switzerland owned Walgreens Boots Alliance eliminating 370 jobs, 270 just within Illinois the other 1-hundred will take place across 20 U.S. states! It’s a direct result of the merger between Walgreens and Boots Alliance. In Elizabeth, clothing store Something Special announced it will shutdown after Xmas. What automotive industry recovery? Moline based farm vehicle maker Deere (formerly John Deere) shutdown their Tianjin, China, ops as a result of last week’s 21-thousand metric tons explosions that rocked the port city. It’s still not know what sparked the earthquake causing blasts.
Massachusetts: In Cambridge, after 35 years Berk’s Shoes shutdown, the general manager blamed the suck-ass economy and never ending local road construction: “…the climate in the country makes it really difficult for small business, local business, independent business to survive. It’s a sad day for us…”-Mickey Holland
Michigan: Grand Rapids Board of Education voted unanimously to layoff seven teachers. For every student the district loses it also loses $7,391 USD in funding.
Minnesota: Restaurant Zen Box shutdown their skyway location last week.
Missouri: A new study by the Federal Reserve Bank‘s Saint Louis regional office has concluded that getting a college degree does not do anything to improve your financial position, at least not if you’re ‘black’ or ‘hispanic’!
Montana: Stillwater Mining laid off 119 employees! Back in July they laid off 11, it’s blamed on crashing prices of platinum and palladium.
New Hampshire: Macy’s shutting down another store, this time in Bedford, just in time for Thanksgiving. It’s part of the retailer’s plan to eliminate 2-thousand 5-hundred jobs by the end of the year!
New York: NYC based Harper’s Magazine revealed that college edumacation is a economic ripoff (How College Sold its Soul).
Ohio: God’s ‘christian’ president of Ashland University eliminated 23 faculty positions despite strong student enrollment numbers and a $3-million USD surplus at the end of the 2014 school year! The Cleveland Clinic announced it is kicking McDonald’s out of its food court, as part its new War on Fat People. To show you how a-feared people are of the Anti-Fast Food Police State a technician at the clinic was caught by news media eating a Mickey D’s meal and he wimp assedly confessed “Every now and again I stray just a little. I don’t eat too much of it. I just wanted it right now.” I don’t like McDonald’s but you better not come here to Idaho and try and take away my Carl’s Junior!!!
Pennsylvania: In State College, gas station-convenience store Sheetz shutdown on East College Avenue. Administrators indicated that food and beverage sales were too low. Finland based mining equipment company Metso announced that it will shutdown its York factory, 80 people will become jobless by March 2016. And as more proof that your average ‘Merican employee doesn’t pay attention to economic news, one Metso employee said “I feel like I was on a 10-foot ladder and got knocked down. It’s a shock.”
Washington: More proof the internet is not recession proof; the 3-thousand employees of shopping network Zulily are demanding to know what’s going on as their boss announced the surprise sale of Seattle based Zulily to Pennsylvania based QVC. The CEO of five years old Zulily bold faced lied and said “This acquisition is not about cost savings”, my decades of experience with unAmerican corporate America is that such sales or mergers are precisely about “cost savings” (job cuts), and that managers are not above bold face lying about job security to the faces of their employees!
17 August 2015:“everything is on the table”
WARN=Worker Adjustment & Retraining Notification
The U.S. Department of Labor (DoL) no longer issues mass layoff reports: “On March 1, 2013, President Obama ordered into effect the across-the- board spending cuts (commonly referred to as sequestration) required by the Balanced Budget and Emergency Deficit Control Act, as amended. Under the order, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) must cut its current budget by more than $30 million, 5 percent of the current 2013 appropriation, by September 30, 2013. In order to help achieve these savings and protect core programs, the BLS will eliminate two programs, including Mass Layoff Statistics, and all ‘measuring green jobs’ products. This news release is the final publication of monthly mass layoff survey data.”