Monday was a doozy for economic news. In one fell swoop, several major global companies announced their plans to lay off thousands of workers. Collectively, the businesses plan to eliminate more than 65,000 jobs [1] around the world. Economists are obviously worried about the pattern of layoffs, so now is as good of a time as any to plump up your emergency fund [2].
- Caterpillar: 20,000 job cuts
- Sprint Nextel: 8,000
- Home Depot: 7,000
- Pfizer / Wyeth merger: 8,000
- General Motors: 2,000 cuts in Michigan and Ohio
- Texas Instruments: 3,400
- ING: 7,000
- Philips: 6,000
- Corus: 3,500
Source [3]