Where the Layoffs Are—Is Your Firm on the List? CNBC.com | 04 Dec 2008 | 09:32 AM ET
Another round of layoffs Thursday from some of the stock market's biggest names helped add to the employment gloom.
Dow components AT&T and DuPont both said they would be cutting thousands of positions on fears that 2009 would be a difficult year for corporate America.
The job picture has continued to dim considerably in recent weeks, particularly in the financial sector, as Citigroup confirmed it would be cutting as many as 53,000 jobs, while JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America announced deep staff cuts as they absorb fallen financial institutions, Washington Mutual and Merrill Lynch, respectively.
The pain is global. On Dec. 2 European bank heavyweights Credit Suisse and HSBC Holdings announced they were axing hundreds of jobs in Britain as the biggest financial crisis since the Great Depression bites. Two days later Credit Suisse announced even more layoffs.
The cuts are the latest in a wave of job losses in which over 100,000 jobs have been axed at major global financial institutions since September.
The number of U.S. workers on jobless benefits rolls hit a 26-year high last month, although initial claims dipped last week, underscoring the rapid deterioration in the labor market.
The four-week moving average of new weekly jobless claims, a better gauge of underlying labor trends because it irons out week-to-week volatility, rose to 524,500 last week, the highest reading since Dec. 18, 1982. This compared to 518,250 the prior week.
The latest moves in the banking sector come amid an overall wave of layoffs across the United States, and Europe, as companies move to cut costs in the face of slackening demand and a general economic downturn.
Indeed, the National Association of Business Economists' recent poll of 50 professional forecasters said U.S. economy is in recession and will contract at a faster pace in the fourth quarter. The unemployment rate was likely to peak at 7.5 percent by the third quarter of 2009. The latest jobs report put the unemployment at 6.5 percent, a 15-year high.
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