Report: Dell Layoffs Are About To Hit and Could Be Huge

[shade91]

Aside from rackmount servers there isn't anything Dell makes good these days, and even then it is still debatable if their rackmounts and blades are good. I don't bother with Dell much and usually recommend and install Cisco UCS.

 

[SticKx911]

Lets take this back into history a little bit, did the advancement of farming equipment fuck up the bottom line of farmers? Did the creation of the assembly line streamlining a factory fuck up the bottom line of any industry?

People need to eat, not buy dells. I don't consider that as a great comparison. Plus part of me wants to say that before automation they were using slaves, but I'm thinking my timeline is off.

 

[SticKx911]

People need to eat, not buy dells. I don't consider that as a great comparison. Plus part of me wants to say that before automation they were using slaves, but I'm thinking my timeline is off.

And I was referring to the farm industry. If I could edit or I'd just cut that comment out.

 

[kbrickley]

Why are we so quick to start hating on American workers yet hesitate to hold the people actually responsible accountable?

Some people making a decent wage (and spending that money to drive the economy) are probably going to get fired.

Michael Dell is still going to take home MILLIONS of dollars next year. Where is the hatred for him and his ilk? These people are the real villains. They only care about the bottom line while blaming the people actually doing the work for the state or their corporations.

Until they announce the actual layoff so we can see who is affected it is hard to villainize the company completely ... Dell employs more than 100,000 workers around the world ... if they feel that the layoff of 20,000 of those helps protect the job of the 80,000 left then that is something they have to consider

There have been companies who have done very questionable layoffs (layoff existing experienced workers who are promptly replaced with less experience but cheaper workers) and there have been companies who need to readjust their workforce to remain or become competitive ... I took a voluntary separation from Intel back in 2002 (and didn't have any animosity for them after I left) ... sometimes a company needs to make adjustments to their workforce due to new market requirements or changes in strategy ... Intel gave me a nice package (I had been there 14 years when I left) and I received about 11 months compensation (and resume assistance) ... I judge a layoff more by how they treat their employees and what the rationale and affected worker population is

 

[Ducman69]

It is true that people like Michael Dell and the like have compensation packages that are completely divorced from their value and contribution as individuals to the company. Absolutely you don't give a private in the Army the same pay grade as a general, that's socialism and against human nature to strive to push forward. But when CEOs are making hundreds of times the mean average salary of their employees and getting golden parachutes and multimillion dollar bonuses while declaring bankruptcy for the company, its BS and outrageous.

However, because we are talking about a handful of these 1%ers, they simply do not affect the bottom line of the company and whether or not they need to downsize to stay afloat.

I am pissed though about that in general, and I don't know what the fix is. Tax them too heavily in this global economy, and they can just shift their assets overseas and you lose out big time. And yes, when the business suffers due to poor management decisions, they deserve flak for that, no doubt.

 

[kbrickley]

It is true that people like Michael Dell and the like have compensation packages that are completely divorced from their value and contribution as individuals to the company. Absolutely you don't give a private in the Army the same pay grade as a general, that's socialism and against human nature to strive to push forward. But when CEOs are making hundreds of times the mean average salary of their employees and getting golden parachutes and multimillion dollar bonuses while declaring bankruptcy for the company, its BS and outrageous.

However, because we are talking about a handful of these 1%ers, they simply do not affect the bottom line of the company and whether or not they need to downsize to stay afloat.

I am pissed though about that in general, and I don't know what the fix is. Tax them too heavily in this global economy, and they can just shift their assets overseas and you lose out big time. And yes, when the business suffers due to poor management decisions, they deserve flak for that, no doubt.

Steve Jobs, for all the abuse he took from the Apple haters, actually had the right strategy ... salary of $1 and the rest in stock ... if company value increases then his compensation increases

In a perfect world the CEO salaries would be like the old shipping captains and crews (or big actors) ... they would be paid according to a percentage of profits or net revenues ... that would be more fair and hold CEOs to some sort of performance standard ... but it is up to the boards and shareholders to start using this strategy ... hopefully some activist investors will push for this strategy and we will see other companies start to make the move in this direction ... CEO salaries haven't always been this high if you look at the historical data:

http://www.forbes.com/2008/04/30/ceo-pay-historic-lead-bestbosses08-cx_sd_0430flash.html

1989 - Avg salary (1.5 million), % ownership (2.1), ownership market value (56 million)
2000 - Avg salary (2.6 million), % ownership (2.3), ownership market value (593 million)
2008 - Avg salary (3.3 million), % ownership (1.3), ownership market value (376 million)

The boards and shareholders have driven these rates up and it is now in their domain to drive them back down again

 

[rudy]

I am kinda OK with hating on American workers my big problem is that the US government has not in many years seen fit to make other countries which steal our jobs play fair. Good luck if you are any USA based company trying to get anywhere in China, yet a Chinese company can come buy a whole American company and sell anything it wants in this country with just about no problem.

Yes the American worker is not as competitive on some fronts but at the same time neither is the worker in another country where the country forbids most outside competition. Its a one way street and if the American government had ever actually done their job of protecting the American interest those countries would not be able to do that and many American companies would be doing way better in developing nations.

Want to sell cars for any reasonable price in India, you have to make the car in India, same with China, America? psssht, make it anywhere you want and boat it in. lol DUH there are no job here. The only thing they let you buy in half these other countries that is made in America is the stuff they are 10 years behind on and cannot possibly make. But they are moving toward it and when they get there, guess what they will protect that industry too.

You cant get a job in America doing telephone support even if you wanted one because minimum wage means that it is not legal for you to compete on a cost basis with the Indian support. That is right the government made it illegal for you to compete with your competition. But that same government didn't make illegal for your competition to compete with you. No one else sees the problem here?

 

[tlkimball]

I am kinda OK with hating on American workers my big problem is that the US government has not in many years seen fit to make other countries which steal our jobs play fair. Good luck if you are any USA based company trying to get anywhere in China, yet a Chinese company can come buy a whole American company and sell anything it wants in this country with just about no problem.

How do we make other countries play fair? Can you imagine the cry from free enterprisers when the U.S. Government tells them they can't sell their company to anyone they want to?

Want to sell cars for any reasonable price in India, you have to make the car in India, same with China, America? psssht, make it anywhere you want and boat it in. lol DUH there are no job here. The only thing they let you buy in half these other countries that is made in America is the stuff they are 10 years behind on and cannot possibly make. But they are moving toward it and when they get there, guess what they will protect that industry too.

Again: Imagine the screaming when the government tells Wal Mart that they can only buy their goods from U.S. manufacturers. Do we tariff the hell out of foreign goods and start a trade war? It's way more complicated than government involvement.

You cant get a job in America doing telephone support even if you wanted one because minimum wage means that it is not legal for you to compete on a cost basis with the Indian support. That is right the government made it illegal for you to compete with your competition. But that same government didn't make illegal for your competition to compete with you. No one else sees the problem here?

Eliminate minimum wage and drive our low-tier workers further into poverty? Have you seen how people live in India? Is it the American Dream to live like that? Have you ever thought about trying to live at the current minimum wage? Maybe you do. Do you like that mortgage on your single-wide?

The only people that benefit from the absence of a minimum wage are the people that pay wages. You are right: We can't compete with India because of our minimum wage but it would be morally and ethically wrong for those companies making BILLIONS of dollars a year to pay its workers any less than they are right now.

It is the job of the government to protect the people from corporations, not protect corporations from people. If you anyone thinks that is socialist/communist then it is already too late for you. You drank the corporate Kool-Aid.

Ask the people in West Virginia who have no water right now if they wish their government had done a better job monitoring the corporation that just polluted their water supply.

 

[kbrickley]

Eliminate minimum wage and drive our low-tier workers further into poverty? Have you seen how people live in India? Is it the American Dream to live like that? Have you ever thought about trying to live at the current minimum wage? Maybe you do. Do you like that mortgage on your single-wide?

The only people that benefit from the absence of a minimum wage are the people that pay wages. You are right: We can't compete with India because of our minimum wage but it would be morally and ethically wrong for those companies making BILLIONS of dollars a year to pay its workers any less than they are right now.

People generally earn minimum wage because they don't have the skills to demand higher wages ... there is a reason that an engineer or a doctor or a scientist gets far more than minimum wage (there are fewer trained applicants than there are jobs) ... the government would be better off trying to train people who use a minimum wage job as their primary source of income so that they can compete for jobs that pay much more than minimum wage ... people who aren't dependent on a minimum wage job as their sole means of support (teenagers living at home, retired folks getting other income streams, second household incomes, second jobs could then take these positions at the current rates)

It is the job of the government to protect the people from corporations, not protect corporations from people. If you anyone thinks that is socialist/communist then it is already too late for you. You drank the corporate Kool-Aid.

It is the government's job to protect corporations and people from itself (and possibly other countries or other corporations) and not to overly regulate industry or individuals (like it does now) so that the USA loses its competitive edge in the market

 

[tlkimball]

People generally earn minimum wage because they don't have the skills to demand higher wages ... there is a reason that an engineer or a doctor or a scientist gets far more than minimum wage (there are fewer trained applicants than there are jobs) ... the government would be better off trying to train people who use a minimum wage job as their primary source of income so that they can compete for jobs that pay much more than minimum wage ... people who aren't dependent on a minimum wage job as their sole means of support (teenagers living at home, retired folks getting other income streams, second household incomes, second jobs could then take these positions at the current rates)

I'm looking for an argument here for eliminating minimum wage. That was what I was talking about... There are a lot more people than just teenagers and the uneducated earning minimum wage.

It is the government's job to protect corporations and people from itself (and possibly other countries or other corporations) and not to overly regulate industry or individuals (like it does now) so that the USA loses its competitive edge in the market

Absolutely if you believe that corporations ARE people. Otherwise, I hope you enjoyed the Kool-Aid. What flavor did you choose?



Lincoln (and who are we to say that we understand this nation more than he) believed that our nation was founded on a "government of the people, by the people, for the people." I don't see that he mentioned corporations at all.

Seriously: How do you reach the level of protection you mention without over-regulation? You can't have it both ways. How do you propose we maintain our competitive edge with nations that allow their workers to be treated like slaves?

 

[Ducman69]

I'm looking for an argument here for eliminating minimum wage. That was what I was talking about... There are a lot more people than just teenagers and the uneducated earning minimum wage.

Because jobs that have lower value than minimum wage really should be outsourced if possible, and there are much much better ways to drive up minimum wage naturally, and that is to eliminate the 12 million illegal aliens violating US immigration law and drastically driving down the value of unskilled labor.

I used to mow seven lawns in my neighborhood as a kid, using my dad's equipment. It taught me the value of a dollar, kept me busy so I wasn't out causing problems, and it gave me spending cash to buy things that I appreciated a lot more because I worked for them. But that gravy train slowly but surely ended as more and more illegal aliens from South of the border were willing to mow the lawns with large teams at rates where it wasn't even worth my time.

And like myself, I can assure you that the majority aren't declaring income and most certainly aren't net tax income contributors. Also, in the long term, I advanced my career into higher paying skilled jobs and have no children or if I do will have very few and they will in turn also end up paying more in taxes than they consume, benefiting society. With the illegal aliens, they are often already adults and aren't going to advance further and have many children and devastate the property value of areas they move in to, and cost more in taxes than are contributed... that is if they aren't just sending a lot of the money back home outside the US economy entirely.

 

[tlkimball]

Because jobs that have lower value than minimum wage really should be outsourced if possible, and there are much much better ways to drive up minimum wage naturally, and that is to eliminate the 12 million illegal aliens violating US immigration law and drastically driving down the value of unskilled labor.

I used to mow seven lawns in my neighborhood as a kid, using my dad's equipment. It taught me the value of a dollar, kept me busy so I wasn't out causing problems, and it gave me spending cash to buy things that I appreciated a lot more because I worked for them. But that gravy train slowly but surely ended as more and more illegal aliens from South of the border were willing to mow the lawns with large teams at rates where it wasn't even worth my time.

And like myself, I can assure you that the majority aren't declaring income and most certainly aren't net tax income contributors. Also, in the long term, I advanced my career into higher paying skilled jobs and have no children or if I do will have very few and they will in turn also end up paying more in taxes than they consume, benefiting society. With the illegal aliens, they are often already adults and aren't going to advance further and have many children and devastate the property value of areas they move in to, and cost more in taxes than are contributed... that is if they aren't just sending a lot of the money back home outside the US economy entirely.

Popular belief but not necessarily fact:

http://www.brookings.edu/blogs/jobs/posts/2012/05/04-jobs-greenstone-looney

It isn't entirely clear that our jobs are being taken by and our wages driven lower by illegal immigrants. Beyond that, why not place at least some of the blame upon the employers of these people.

Do you think eliminating minimum wage will help the workers of this country? Really?? Do you trust the employers and corporations enough to believe they won't exploit a system with no minimum wage?

 

[Ducman69]

Do you think eliminating minimum wage will help the workers of this country?

You quote me, but then completely ignore what I said. Eliminating minimum wage is not the solution. Eliminating the need for minimum wage by reducing the unskilled labor pool is the solution.

Wages are about supply and demand. If there were billions of doctors when only millions are needed, they would make nothing.

Virtually anyone can do an unskilled labor job, that's the problem, so if you reduce unemployment and reduce the unskilled labor pool via education and stop importing the labor problems of other countries, you eliminate the root of the problem and wages will rise naturally.

And it is perfectly reasonable for there to be jobs out there that are below what an adult supporting a family can comfortably live on, and it is absolutely detrimental to society to make it so that someone stays in an entry level position for life and is comfortable doing a $5 job for $15 an hour... that is until the job is eliminated entirely by automation or outsourcing regardless.

 

[Alai]

Do you really think $604 a week is a lot of money? That seems like chump change to me. Especially if you have kids.

You're actually quite right. They will receive a whopping $426 a week in Texas (nearly as bad as Washington's $604 a week for sitting on your hands), with virtually no oversight as long as you "pretend" to be looking for a job, for up to two years.

While unemployed, you are also eligible for an ungodly amount of discounts, especially if you have kids, so Texas' low cost of living gets REALLY low.

Honestly, if I weren't concerned with how horrible it would look to be unemployed for a whole year gap on my resume, I would have just taken a really long vacation when I was laid off.

It simply blew my mind how much they encourage you not to work. Buddy's live-in girlfriend had one kid and I think was on for 2.5 years or something on extension, even though she was really a stay at home mom and he was the bread winner, lol! She had a lonestar card and discount electricity and internet and wanted for nothing. Pretty sad really.

But unemployed people are just as motivated to work as employed people, and a vote is a vote. So give someone a big handout, and they'll vote for you for life.

 

[Benzino]

I'm trying to figure out how this works. Signing up to be cut? Morale has to be in the shitter.

Last month the company asked workers to volunteer to be cut, called a "voluntary separation program" (VSP), where it asked employees to quit in exchange for a severance package. Not every employee was eligible. Some employees were not happy about the program, saying they had to throw their name in the hat weeks before they would hear if they were accepted.



A source close to the company tells us that the employees heard on Monday who was accepted. This source says that the most heavily affected departments were finance, services, accounting, and sales. Employees who got the ok must stay until the end of January, we're told.


This source thinks that if a broader layoff is coming, it might not be for a few more weeks, until after all of the people leaving under the VSP program have left.

 

[kbrickley]

I'm trying to figure out how this works. Signing up to be cut? Morale has to be in the shitter.

Not necessarily ... I took a voluntary layoff from Intel back in 2002 (and received about 11 months salary in compensation) ... for voluntary layoffs you usually get a better package but it is typically restricted to only certain employees (maybe employees with average or poor reviews) ... if you think you will get the ax anyway this is a good way to get a good package (or if you have other salaries in your household you might want to take the risk) ...

a voluntary layoff can create fewer problems for morale than wholesale layoffs ... it can also create less damage to the company (since you can restrict who qualifies and it might minimize the effects of or needs for broader layoffs)