AP is reporting today that Hewlett-Packard is likely to announce a major layoff when it releases its quarterly results, most likely this afternoon.
HP has declined to comment, but CEO Meg Whitman has made it clear that she believes the company needs to trim its expenses to offset declining revenue and free up more money to pour into research and development.
The looming layoffs could be the largest in HP's 73-year history, surpassing 24,600 jobs cuts announced in 2008 after the company bought consulting service EDS for $13.9 billion.
Yes, it looks like another of the Republican Party's champions of job creation, Meg Whitman, is likely to slice something like 25,000 names from the payroll of one of California's tech icons.
H-P CEO Meg Whitman, of course, failed in her 2010 attempt to buy run for the California governorship. During that campaign, she was all about job creation:
Whitman promises 2 million jobs will be created by her administration, but according to the California State Department of Finance and from independent forecasters, most of that job creation would happen anyway, “without any of Whitman’s policies.” And her determination to slash certain government programs would cause a hemorrhaging of jobs, including more than 63,000 at Medi-Cal and Calworks, California’s Medicaid and employment services programs.
Whitman would also cause all of this economic pain for individual households while simultaneously exacerbating California’s budget crisis. She likes to make a big show of her planned $15 billion in unspecified spending cuts, without noting that California’s fiscal hole for just next year is $20 billion. Her tax plan would also add $6 billion to $10 billion to California’s deficit, offsetting two-thirds of her planned cuts.
A group of 20 California economists — including former Labor Secretary Robert Reich and Nobel Prize winner Kenneth Arrow — have signed a letter stating that “the evidence and theory that Whitman uses to diagnose California’s problems are unscientific and an unsound basis for policy. As a result, her diagnosis and her proposed economic policies are both deeply flawed…If implemented, Whitman’s program would worsen California’s budget malaise and its economic performance.” And her program certainly wouldn’t accomplish what she sees as the number one thing she has to do.
Of course, the connection between California Republican politicians and layoffs at Hewlett-Packard is nothing new. While Ms Whitman was running for Governor, former H-P CEO Carly Fiorina was trying to unseat US Senator Barbara Boxer. What was her message? Job creation. Senator Boxer had a pretty easy time
refuting Ms Fiorina's claim:
The latest attack ad from Sen. Barbara Boxer picks up on a thread introduced in the primary -- accusing Fiorina of laying off tens of thousands of workers at HP, shipping jobs overseas and all the while padding her own bank account and toy box.
Here's what the announcer in the Democratic incumbent's ad says: "As CEO of HP, Carly Fiorina laid off 30,000 workers. Fiorina shipped jobs to China.
"And while Californians lost their jobs, Fiorina tripled her salary, bought a million-dollar yacht and five corporate jets ... Carly Fiorina. Outsourcing jobs. Out for herself."
Ah, those Republicans. They sure know how to create jobs, don't they?
2:16 PM PT: H-P announced earnings this afternoon, and while the results were pretty good, they also announced 27,000 layoffs, about in line with what the AP suggested.