SEATTLE (AP) — Boeing has issued layoff notices to more than 400 members of its aerospace workers’ union, as the company struggles to recover from financial and regulatory issues and an eight-week strike by its machinists’ union. This is part of thousands of planned layoffs amid the ongoing crisis.
The Seattle Times reported that the pink slips were distributed to members of the Aerospace Professional and Technical Employees Association (SPEEA) last week. Employees will be paid until mid-January.
Boeing announced in October that it plans to cut 10% of its workforce, or about 17,000 jobs, over the next few months. CEO Kelly Ortberg told employees the company needed to “reset our workforce levels to align with our financial realities.”
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The Aerospace Professional and Technical Employees Association (SPEEA) union announced that 438 members were affected by the job cuts. The union’s local chapter has 17,000 Boeing employees, most of them based in Washington and some in Oregon, California and Utah.
Of these 438 employees, 218 are members of SPEEA’s professional forces, including engineers and scientists. The rest are members of the technical unit, which includes analysts, planners, engineers, and skilled craftsmen.
Eligible employees will receive outplacement services and subsidized medical benefits for up to three months. Workers also receive severance pay, typically about one week’s salary for every year of service.
Boeing’s unionized machinists began returning to work earlier this month after a strike.
The strike strained Boeing’s finances. But Ortberg said on a conference call with analysts in October that the layoffs were not the result of overstaffing.
Arlington, Virginia-based Boeing has been in financial and regulatory trouble since a panel on an Alaska Airlines plane blew off in January. Production rates have fallen to abysmal levels, and the Federal Aviation Administration has limited production of the 737 MAX to 38 planes per month, a standard that Boeing has yet to reach.
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