State,
ex-IBMers ponder life after layoffs: Brain drain, company's
departure among fears
By Leslie Wright
Free Press Staff Writer
IBM workers whose
jobs were cut in August are officially off the payroll today.
On Aug. 18, IBM, battered by losses in the Microelectronics
Division, told 497 workers that their jobs were eliminated at the
Essex Junction plant. Workers piled their belongings in cardboard
boxes and left the office for good, collecting pay for the next 60
days.
Of the 497 workers who lost their jobs 469 will
actually be terminated, because 28 were able to get other jobs
within the company, said IBM spokesman Jeff Couture. He did not know
how many of the 469 employees were able to find jobs outside IBM.
Employment at the plant stands at 6,200, a 10-year low.
The third round of cuts of high-paying jobs in two years
casts a shadow over an otherwise healthy job recovery in the state
and puts the state at risk for losing highly skilled workers, said
state economist Jeffrey Carr.
Former IBMer Tom Bruno is
worried about his family economics. The 45-year-old Colchester
resident has a wife and three teenage children. His oldest just
started college.
In August after 20 years at Big Blue, Bruno
lost his job as a technician repairing the machines that make
computer chips. As part of his severance package he'll collect 26
weeks' pay, the maximum, beyond the pay he received for the last 60
days.
His wife, Katherine, has taken on extra hours in her
job as a health care provider.
Three weeks ago Bruno took a
part-time job working overnight at The Home Depot in Williston.
Several other former IBMers are working at The Home Depot, he said.
"It's just enabling me to do something. You can only look
for a job so much," Bruno said.
Thursday, a job possibility
at IBM in Fishkill, N.Y., fell through. Bruno is trying to be a
realist in his job search. He'd like to stay in Vermont, but knows
that might not happen. He's prepared to work for less than he made
at IBM.
He realizes he might have to go back to school to
gain skills to find a new job but he's not sure how that will work.
The widely rumored August cuts came on the heels of a $110
million second-quarter loss in the Microelectronics Division, which
includes the Essex Junction plant. For the third quarter, reported
Wednesday, IBM's technology group lost $96 million.
Between
two earlier rounds of cuts and jobs lost through attrition, the
plant's employment has shrunk by 2,300 jobs since 2001. The
cumulative effect of job losses in the past two years will have a
ripple effect on the state's job market, Carr said in the report he
presented to the New England Economic Project Economic Outlook
Conference on Thursday.
Every job lost at IBM translates to
another 2.4 jobs lost through 2005, Carr's report said. Carr pushed
back his estimate for employment recovery and a return to expansion
from May to the end of 2004.
"Indeed, the more than 1,800
jobs permanently lost at the IBM facility by themselves over the
past two years would represent the equivalent of one of the state's
five largest employers in 2003," the report said.
Another
potential fallout of the job cuts is the exodus of talented workers
from the state's labor pool, Carr said.
"There's been
remarkable resiliency to offset what's been happening at IBM
statewide," Carr said. "What I'm worried about is, this last 500
installment we may have reached a point where the industry can't
absorb it and that's were I'm concerned we lose some talented
workers."
Many have feared that persistent losses in the
technology group and major investment in new technology at IBM's
plant in Fishkill could threaten the Essex plant's existence. Those
fears were eased somewhat last week when Lt. Gov. Brian Dubie said
the plant's highest executive told him IBM plans to invest $150
million in the Essex plant.
Bruno said he's trying not to
look back or think about the place he spent his entire career.
"I'm going to walk away and do what I can do to survive and
not care about IBM," he said.
