IBM to Lose 13,000 Jobs 516
KingDaveRa writes "The BBC is reporting that IBM is losing 13,000 jobs. This comes after disappointing financial results. Most jobs will be going in europe."
"Being against torture ought to be sort of a bipartisan thing." -- Karl Lehenbauer
Losing your job is hard (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Losing your job is hard (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Losing your job is hard (Score:5, Insightful)
No it isn't. It's incredibly easy to lose your job. You hardly have to do anything. In fact that's the best way. Hardly do anything and I assure you that you will lose your job.
Re:Losing your job is hard (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Losing your job is hard (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Losing your job is hard (Score:2)
You've never worked in a large company right? Do nothing and you'll be promoted out of the way or moved sideways.
Someone needs to educate you. Go read some Dilbert and watch the movie Office Space.
Re:Losing your job is hard (Score:2)
Hardly do anything and I assure you that you will lose your job.
Upper levels of government provide a counterexample to this thesis.
As do beneficiaries of inherited wealth whose job is "stockholder".
But, then, I'm overcounting some.
Re:Losing your job is hard (Score:3, Funny)
Maybe if you did do something there is a chance it could go wrong and I'd be sacked but more likely me doing something would have the knock on effect of causing someone else to have to do something, a scenario which would no doubt be frowned on and could result in me getting the sack.
Re:Losing your job is hard (Score:5, Insightful)
not to mention police officers and firemen who put their life on the line every day for even less money than that.
all to have themselves lumped into the statement (and I can assure you common public sentiment) "Unless you're a public servant... in which case, doing nothing will result in a promotion."
guess what; getting a raise of any kind as a public servant is quite a thing. sometimes entire classes of public servant have to go on strike to be recognized with even a pittance of a raise after years of watching prices go up but not their wages.
many police forces and district attorney's offices are understaffed, underpaid, and overworked. we see a few ficticious examples on TV perhaps to the contrary, but those are really both few and for the most part ficticious. yes there are lazy podunk police precincts, there are abusive cops, etc.
but there are a hell of a lot of people working their asses off in dangerous conditions for little pay or chance of meaningful promotion (where promotion means more than a different placard for your cubicle).
and don't get me started on the National Guardsmen or Army Reservists, or even full-time military.
public service can bring an immense amount of meaning to one's life. it's simply too bad that so many want to demean all public servants because of the atrocities of a few or television's take on a few in some of the largest cities in the world.
maybe you mean the clerks at the DMV, or the post office, or garbage men, or the psychiatrists at the VA. guess what, not even all of them are lazy assholes who would prefer for you to wait as long as possible.
yes, there are lazy people in public service. there are lazy people every-damn-where in America. if you find it okay to call all public servants lazy, then perhaps you also find it okay to call all Americans lazy?
Re:Losing your job is hard (Score:2)
Re:Losing your job is hard (Score:4, Interesting)
I work for a county government. There are some good people, yes, but there are also a lot of people who play backstabbing games (particularly with those of us on contract to the county) or who can't bear to let a little bit of control leave their desks. I've had to go out to the various agencies and the amount of random chatter I see happening is far and away more than I ever saw when working in large corporations. Deadlines on simple projects are missed by months -- we're more than a year behind on rolling out one e-mail server because of politics involved with other agencies trying to shape our Active Directory implementation.
The highest quotients of good people are usually where the workers are most visible -- police, fire, DA/PubDef, probation, and healthcare and social services field personnel. Get back in the offices, though, and the signal to noise ratio can get extraordinarily bad.
Re:Losing your job is hard (Score:2)
5 was my lucky number.
"Losing" is completely the wrong verb. (Score:5, Insightful)
IBM is not "losing" jobs; IBM is firing people.
The only way IBM could lose jobs is if it's Human Resources Department realized it could not locate the job descriptions for 13,000 people.
Worse still, can you "plan to lose" something? Of course not. Losses are unintentional.
Re:"Losing" is completely the wrong verb. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:"Losing" is completely the wrong verb. (Score:3, Insightful)
Sometimes you have to make the decision of firing people now, so that others can keep their jobs later.
At least... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Losing your job is hard (Score:2, Funny)
__o__
| <--- you
/ \
Hmm not a suprise (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Hmm not a suprise (Score:2)
And Lucifer Gerstner is still rich as hell. Satan Palmisano is on his way.
Not to mention, they are about to settle with the pensioners they screwed six years ago.
Hell, I got a $63 settlement from it. But I'm not bitter. Pffft!
Re:Hmm not a suprise (Score:2, Informative)
(1) the sale of PCD included selling the employees. PCD lay-offs will appear as Lenovo actions.
(2) PCs are manufactured outside Europe (Mexico, China, etc.).
The loss of however many jobs is still unfortunate.
My uncle (Score:5, Interesting)
The UK as a whole seems to be moving towards this kind of economy - jobs involving manufacturing, especially, are going, to be replaced by jobs where you can be sacked at the drop of a hat, and are generally pretty poorly treated. Sad.
Re:My uncle (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:My uncle (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:My uncle (Score:5, Insightful)
A better system would be to provide a living wage (as opposed to the welfare dirty word) to those people whose jobs are increasingly replaced by automation and cheap labor. If you're one of the lucky few who still does USEFUL work in exchange for something, then you get extra incentive gravy for your WANTS, while those not so lucky/smart/quickly-adaptable get enough redistributed gravy to meet their NEEDS. Nobody should have to live in mortal fear of losing their job (unless you're one of those asshole sadists who believes that keeping the serfs suffering is a great motivator and makes it easier to keep control (and if so, fuck you)).
Robotics, IA/AI, nanotechnology, and other exponentially advancing technology [kurzweilai.net] will inevitably lead to this kind of world. "It's different this time". We can either choose a humane leisure society fed by intelligent automated production & fair redistribution, or we can choose to continue the greedy ratrace to the bottom as the wealth gap widens [blogspot.com].
(I'm sure a lot of people who worship at the alter of dog-eat-dog hyper-capitalism and "globalism" will just write me off as some kind of idealistic-socialist-commie-hippie or whatever. Oh, and I am one of the "lucky" ones, but I've also got a conscience.)
Re:My uncle (Score:2, Insightful)
So do I, and that's exactly why I do not believe in robbing Peter to give to Paul. The fact that government is "giving" to Paul (and -- cough -- taking a cut for themselves) does not, by any rational means, make the act of robbing Peter moral and just.
And please spare me the lies about the people "choosing" to submit themselves to force. A person cannot voluntarily submit to force, any more than a person can force another person to volunteer.
Re:My uncle (Score:3, Insightful)
The trick is in the choice of terms here: what if Peter is an oligopolistic Robber Baron who scammed billions of Peters until their livelhood became untennable? You would like to present it as a case of saintly, highly-talented, God's favourtie child Peter innocently and piously pursuing his "destiny" to great wealth and unlimited power over others and on the other hand a Satanic band of evil, underhanded, greedy wolf-like Pa
Re:My uncle (Score:2, Informative)
That's called socialism [wikipedia.org]. This is a democracy. Be sure and understand that distinction as it leads to a government-controlled life.
Re:My uncle (Score:5, Insightful)
This in one of my pet peeves.
Yes it is called socialism but you can have a socialist democracy.
You are confusing economic systems with political systems.
China has less of a socialist economy than Sweden does. But Sweden is far more democratic than China.
I agree that giving people money for nothing is wrong. It is degrading and self defeating. What we need get back to is the idea that there is dignity in all work. It does not matter if it is picking up trash in a park what you earn is yours.
Re:My uncle (Score:2)
Unfortunately, it is the latter that I see coming. I don't see people agreeing that 1+1=2, much less conforming to a global social/economic system like the one you describe.
Re:My uncle (Score:2, Informative)
Re:My uncle (Score:3, Insightful)
Toshiba (the evil greedy capitalist corporation) is producing a new nano-battery in 2006 that has the potential to cut pollution dramatically as it'll be used in cars instead of gasoline. Greed leads to good things and cheaper products much faster and
Re:My uncle (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:My uncle (Score:2)
[Re: Transitioning manual labour jobs to mechanical automation]
Thats been going on in the US since the 80s. It SUCKS.
I respectfully disagree. That automation is what keeps the price of so many products affordable. The increased profits from said automation are what have driven stock price increases that have allowed millions of people to enjoy a comfortable retirement. This is capitalism at its finest. If you don't like it, there are plenty of (miserable, socialist/communist) countries who'd be will
Re:My uncle (Score:2)
I have not heard a single complaint from any [mb]illionare CEO. Being that the range of wages between the lowest and the highest paid employees keeps getting larger, I would only expect this type of system to increase until it implodes on itself.
Fuck benevolence, that does not show up on profits.
Re:My uncle (Score:3, Informative)
My mum works at IBM and the IBM/Lenovo split is a very short time off now. This is the main transition point for the company. Your uncle losing his job most likely is that Lenovo is unwilling to hire him, not IBM 'firing' him.
IBM has been making hairline profits on their PCD section for years and years, under very heavy competition. They're changing their whole buisness setup. Losses are to be expected...
Re: My uncle (Score:2, Interesting)
Re: My uncle (Score:5, Informative)
Mrs T. was keen to cut away the dead wood (the declining shipbuilding industries) in order to give tax breaks to the South East. Not a bad thing by itself, but the money saved would have been better invested in retraining and education for the communities in the North of England. At the time of these cutbacks, the local people were crying out for financial assistance in regenerating their cities, but Mrs T. wouldn't help - She was only interested in tax-breaks for the City. As a result the Militant faction of Labour gained power [bbc.co.uk]. This led to Mrs T. imposing rate-capping [nwlg.org] on the various Labour city councils. Both sides (Militant Labour and the Conservatives) realized that this was going to be the class war of the decade and were determined to fight to the bitter end.
The collateral damage of this war, was that the middle classes left the inner cities a generation ago, moved down South and have never returned. It was only a decade later with financial aid from the EEC that the North of England is slowly regenerating. But the only new business that are setting up are service jobs: supermarkets, pubs, nightclubs and maybe the odd software company,.which usually gets bought out.
Instead, the communities in the North of England have continued emigration, with everyone who could, having moved down to the South of England, which itself is now becoming overcrowded and overpriced (So overcrowded, that they even building flats and houses on the communal piece of grass in the squares (three streets facing each other).
The current Labour government is trying to fix this "North-South divide" by dispersing asylum seekers and moving government jobs away from the South of England, but everyone wants to stay where the wealth is.
Re: My uncle (Score:2)
Re: My uncle (Score:2)
Mainly students and casual workers (we refer to them neds, scallies, chavs) - the government wants 50% of all school-leavers to continue onto university. Asylum seekers work as bartenders for minimum wage (5 pounds/hour).
Re: My uncle (Score:2)
The workers who were laid off could have been retrained as brickies, plumbers (who are more engineers as they have to repair/install electric showers), electricians, and joiners.
Ironically, a plumber in the UK can now earn over £100K/year [plumbing-school.co.uk], more than double that of a software architect.
Re: My uncle (Score:2)
Re:My uncle (Score:2)
That's good! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:That's good! (Score:5, Funny)
Wheel? Never heard of it before!
Australia (Score:2)
Re:That's good! (Score:2)
See the opportunity (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:See the opportunity (Score:2)
If any UK readers think this is a good idea, bear in mind how the danger of software patents would make life disproportinately harder for small businesses, and vote accordingly in today's general election.
Yeah, I know it's not a European election; the question is, do you want to support those that will make your life harder because thei
Re:See the opportunity (Score:2)
Re:See the opportunity (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:See the opportunity (Score:2)
Lets weight this out.
Get laid off from your OK 40 hr per week job with benefits, etc to start a company where your insane to expect to work anything near 40/week plus the responsibilities of managing employees, getting startup loans or capitol, with no guarantee that you will make anything like you were making at your old 40hr/week job. Oh, and all of this is assuming that you are a risk taker and have the minimum k
RSS of this story (Score:2, Interesting)
http://www.nanikore.net/?p=364 [nanikore.net]
erm (Score:5, Informative)
Dont forget about Poland (Score:5, Interesting)
IBM is expanding in Poland, hiring almost 200 people in Cracow alone, and so are
many other big name companies like Motorolla, KPMG, Lufthansa, 3M, Phillips:
http://miasta.gazeta.pl/krakow/1,35798,2689839.ht
everyone in europe is moving to Poland, its as nice as Ireland, just as many drunks
but much cheaper, people are educated, and lots of beautifull clean land.
--
/apz, Don't kid yourself. Little is relevant, and nothing lasts forever.
Re:Dont forget about Poland (Score:2)
Re:Dont forget about Poland (Score:2)
However, disregarding culture (and upbringing in general) as a large factor in how a person acts is plain stupid as studies have shown. For example a person from an individualistic soci
Re:Dont forget about Poland (Score:2)
Unless there's been actual evidence one way or the other I wouldn't consider either opinion FUD.
Uh, people? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Uh, people? (Score:2)
Re:Uh, people? (Score:2)
Re:Uh, people? (Score:2)
Multi-national corps do not outsource (Score:3, Funny)
Advice to the corporate slave ... A Rant (Score:5, Insightful)
The stock holders must be paid first, the CE0, the board, everybody with VP in their title second, and --- if there is anything left --- you.
That doesn't mean they won't take your stapler and forget to pay you. It means that you are nothing to them, all those times you supported the Republician party because you believed in lower taxes and less government, lies. Your pay has decreased since they took (and I really mean took) office. Sure, the price of your home as gone up, but the bank still owns it and you pay even more in property taxes and insurance costs. Oh, and don't use that insurance. Too many claims (and by too many I mean one) and you are off looking to the state for help, because no one will insure your castle. And you now that government help is bad. You don't want to be a welfare queen do you?
So, follow my advice. When the corporation tells you to bend over and take it up the arse. Just do it. Then, head straight for the nearest pub. You will need a good pint and this may be the last time you can afford one.
Re:Advice to the corporate slave ... A Rant (Score:3, Interesting)
Keep doomsaying and maybe you'll be back in power. That's a lot easier than coming up with your own ideas and presenting them in a way that brings people to your side.
How times have changed (Score:3, Informative)
How times have changed. I'm sorry to hear about how this will impact the lives of all those people affected, directly and indirectly.
Re:How times have changed (Score:3, Funny)
I think what you meant was:
The Great Depression was bad. Really bad. You couldn't believe how vastly, hugely mind-boggingly bad it was. I mean, you may think the Dot.Com era was a horrible circumstance, but that's just peanuts to the Great Depression.
Re:How times have changed (Score:2)
IBM cut their global workforce by tens of thousands. Not that I'm speaking from personal experience, but the one thing I've admirred IBM for in the past was the way they treat their employees...even when they have to take drastic measure, they try to be transparent in their decision making process and their severance packag
Re:How times have changed (Score:2)
of course, DEC went belly-up - but it sure had its share of layoffs before that. when I was there, the employee base was about 120,000 people! and we bragged that we had the largest private network in the world (EASYnet). by the t
They're Not Lost.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Hmmmm... (Score:2, Interesting)
Perhaps Microsoft (European division perhaps) could hire the retrenched IBM staff?
Europe in a not so graceful decline (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Europe in a not so graceful decline (Score:2, Insightful)
How does this work? (Score:3, Insightful)
"The news comes just weeks after IBM reported worse-than-expected earnings in the first quarter."
Why fire 13,000 workers for that? It's clear that it's the profit forcasters that are doing the crap job - fire them.
Funny (Score:2)
So how many of them were attorneys? (Score:2)
IBM is a notoriously lawer-centric corporation.
If their press release said "IBM laid off 13000 attorneys to hire 13000 engineers" I'd be buying their stock. As it is, I hope the hedge fund managers ride this bitch ALL the way down.
oil industry still cutting jobs (Score:2)
Whats the net change? (Score:2)
Last August IBM said it was adding 19000 jobs. Now they are cutting 10-13k.
They are 10k employees from their record high in 1991 when most considered IBM the most evil tech company on the planet.
Are the growing or shrinking? Strange to switch so fast.
"IBM sets free a workforce" (Score:3, Insightful)
"IBM sets free a workforce of 14,000 skilled workers".
It's all about spin. After all, people thought it was cool when the Sovjet Union collapsed and set free millions of workers employed in the military complex.
Wal-Mart to Hire 600,000 (Score:3, Funny)
Uncomforable Irony (Score:3, Funny)
Bob: Yeeeah, Hi Bob. We had a problem over the weekend..
John: Geez Bob, sounds bad, what happened?
Bob: Well, its embarrassing, but we seem to have lost your job
John: You lost it ?!?
Bob: Like I said, its embarrassing. And it wasnt just yours. Looks like we misplaced a good 13,000 of them
John: So I'm fired ?!?
Bob: Oh no not at all. You're a great employee John we'd never fire you. Lose you job yes, fire no.
John: I'm going to look for a new job..
Bob: Well if you find your old one let me know!
Re:veryhai (Score:4, Insightful)
Atleast if the jobs went to India, someone would gain, as Indians would get more jobs.
I dont know why this resentment over jobs going to India. India is a poor country and many people cant find jobs easily and there is no welfare system, so if you dont have a job your as good as on the streets. India can use all the jobs it can get!
Re:veryhai (Score:2)
Re:veryhai (Score:5, Insightful)
From a 1st world view, these jobs are horrible. From a 3rd world view, these jobs rock.
Re:veryhai (Score:2)
Re:veryhai (Score:2)
We resent jobs going to India because we can't compete with Indians. If jobs were moving because there aren't enough skill workers available here, or because the cities are dirty, crime ridden shit holes or because the taxes are too high that would be one thing - we could work with that. But none of that's the case. These jobs are going to India because they have skilled workers working for a fraction of a western minimum wage. Nothing we can po
Instead of blaming India... (Score:2)
Forget all the claims about productivity of workers in the US or Western Europe, too: star
Did you RTFA before commenting? (Score:2)
Or is your statement more broadly ignorant than that altogether where it's better to fire people outright than outsource?
Re:Pray for forgiveness sinners! (Score:2, Funny)
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Governments Should Tax Their Profits More (Score:2, Insightful)
Makes a corporation think twice about locating there in the first place. Better to have loved and lost...
I'm afraid I don't see any simple solutions to this trend.
Re:Governments Should Tax Their Profits More (Score:2)
You're ignoring the gains to a country's economy when (since they're moved operations to a cheaper country) that company can lower its prices and be more competitive. What about all the money that domestic customers save as a result of outsourcing? How do you propose to factor that into the equation?
Sure, the benefit may not start to
Re:moving to cheaper countries (Score:5, Interesting)
Once they've handed their own jobs to these people they then get moved to 'project teams'.
Will be interesting to see how many redunancies are made without ever suggesting that the jobs have been moved to India.
Re:moving to cheaper countries (Score:3, Insightful)
If you think it's fake, I'll sell you my IBM shares for what they were worth in January. It's real enough for me. It's pretty naive to think that something like this would be a facade given the huge amount of press and criminal prosecution has gone into condemning fiscal tricks here in the US.
And yes, the point is valid that the UK is partcularly expensive right now. A "cheaper" country could well be the US. W
I love it (Score:3)
I've been in that position. (Score:2)
13,000 is a tiny, miniscule number out of the workforce of a single country never mind 25 countries.
If you're willing and able to move to where the work is it's easy to get a new job. If you are unwilling or unable then you may well be in for a long wait.
Life's a bitch, then you die. (Score:2)
Welcome to the free market.
Re:Wasn't that expected? (Score:2)
Re:A quote to all the corporate Stalins out there (Score:2, Insightful)
Also, I am sure it is far from a "RANDOM-act-of-God" move. You don't fire your best employee. You fire the least-profitable one. And if you are the one who has been marked as the least-profitable, shame on you for not having foresi
Re:Job losses voluntary in Europe - facts (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:IBM and Linux (Score:2)