Microsoft layoffs in U.S. not India and China, IBM keeps low profile

Date: Wednesday, January 28, 2009 8:53 PM

<<<<< JOB DESTRUCTION NEWSLETTER No. 1966 -- 1/28/2009 >>>>>

Microsoft is axing 5,000 people but they haven't been very forthcoming on who
and where the cuts will come from. Senator Grassley wasted no time to send an
inquiry to Microsoft asking how many H-1Bs will be among those who lose their
jobs. In answer Microsoft said it is cutting a "significant number" of foreign
workers as part of the layoff of 1,400 employees last week. How significant is
anyone's guess because they didn't give any numbers. Hopefully Grassley will
get a response from MS that's more specific.

Patrick Thibodeau just published an article for Computerworld that has a quote
that is such a classic globalist point of view it deserves some
discussion:

An immigration attorney at Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman LLP,
said, "In fact, the law is very well designed to say that you
have to treat H-1Bs the same as U.S. citizens in all regards."

So, at Microsoft your citizenship doesn't matter -- everyone is just a global
unit of labor. Microsoft puts no special value on its staff of US citizens so
during layoffs everyone should be expected to be treated "the same". During
mass layoffs of this type it would be an improvement if US citizens were
treated equally but they aren't. As I have explained in many previous
newsletters, US Citizens are not a protected class but H-1Bs are.
What that means in a practical sense is that companies like Microsoft expose
themselves to less risk of civil lawsuits from US citizens than they do from
H-1Bs. So, to put this in perspective, US citizens and H-1Bs aren't treated
equally because H-1Bs are harder to get rid of, and since they generally earn
less, employers have very little incentive to walk H-1Bs out the front door
before American employees.

Ironically H-1Bs usually get more sympathy while the plight of U.S. workers is
ignored. Read this carefully because the implicit anti-American bias shown by
Microsoft spokesman Lou Gellos is very common in corporate circles and it's
often repeated in the mainstream media:

Gellos said the firm recognizes "the human impact that our workforce
reduction has on every affected worker and their families."

"For many of the employees here on a visa, being laid off means that
they have to leave the country on very short notice, in many cases
uprooting families and children," Gellos said.

Gellos laments the fact that when H-1Bs lose their jobs they have to go back
to their home country. Too bad about their families, but H-1B is a temporary
work visa. If those foreign temp workers cared about keeping their families
intact they should have come to the U.S. alone! Many American contractors in
the US that work temporary assignments that require them to be in different
locales and yet they don't move their family every time they get a new
contract. That's the nature of contract work, and that's all an H-1B is.

This is a good example why H-1B workers shouldn't be allowed to bring families
to the U.S. because once that happens we get the bleeding heart liberals and
corporate robber barons that try to appeal to everyone's sympathy. All of this
gives H-1Bs a hook to stay here permanently, and that gets even stronger if
they have an anchor baby while they are here.

While Microsoft is axing people in the U.S. the same is not true in India and
China. The Seattle Times reports that there will be very few jobs lost in
China, and the India Times said there will be no jobs lost there.
Microsoft Singapore announced that in all of East Asia less than 10 jobs will
be eliminated.

So, that poor H-1B that everyone is sobbing about will have to leave the U.S.
in order to work at Microsoft in India. Good for the H-1B but what about the
laid off American who will have to get in a soup line in order to eat?
Remember, most countries like India don't have a visa like H-1B, so Americans
better not count on moving there to get a job.

It's worth noting that Google, Intel, IBM, TI, HP, and Nextel are doing the
same thing as Microsoft but they are getting far less publicity and no
scrutiny from lawmakers.

IBM is an interesting case because they are undergoing large layoffs
throughout the United States and yet their total head count is going up.
That might sound strange, but remember we have a global economy now, and as we
found out these companies show no favoritism to US citizens.

IBM's ongoing labor adjustments have led the company to add bodies
in cheaper and higher-growth parts of the world, like India.

In 2007, the last full year for which detailed employment numbers
are available, 121,000 of IBM's 387,000 workers were in the U.S.,
down slightly from the year before. Meanwhile, staffing in India
has jumped from just 9,000 workers in 2003 to 74,000 workers in
2007.

RESOURCES:

http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9126805&source=toc
Microsoft: H-1B workers among those losing jobs

http://blog.seattletimes.nwsource.com/techtracks/2009/01/27/microsoft_layoffs_have_minimal_impact_in_china_no.html
Microsoft layoffs have minimal impact in China; no immediate cuts in India

http://www.jlmpacificepoch.com/newsstories?id=140190_0_5_0_M
Google China Guarantees No Layoffs, Microsoft China "to Feel Little Effect"

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/News/News_By_Industry/Jobs/Microsoft_to_axe_5000_no_job_cuts_in_India/articleshow/4018523.cms
Microsoft to axe 5,000, no job cuts in India

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hTRob6LXiiLWNPqpGUhdfLWN7WdgD95VP2Q81
IBM quietly cuts thousands of jobs

http://www.networkworld.com/news/2009/012609-minimal-asia-pacific-impact-from.html?hpg1=bn
Minimal Asia Pacific impact from 5,000 job cuts: Microsoft

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http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9126805&source=toc

Microsoft: H-1B workers among those losing jobs

No legal obligation to keep U.S. workers over visa holders in layoff, says
attorney
Patrick Thibodeau

January 26, 2009 Microsoft Corp. said it is cutting a "significant number"

of foreign workers as part of the layoff of 1,400 employees last week, a
number that is due to reach 5,000 over the next 18 months.

The company isn't detailing how many of the workers losing their jobs are
in the U.S. on a visa, however.

Microsoft has been urged by Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa), a leading
critic of the H-1B program, to protect the jobs of U.S. workers over
foreign workers. In a letter last week to Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer,
Grassley demanded that U.S. workers get priority in keeping their jobs.

But there is nothing in the law that requires a company to cut the jobs of
H-1B workers before U.S. workers, said experts. David Kussin, an
immigration attorney at Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman LLP, said, "In
fact, the law is very well designed to say that you have to treat H-1Bs the
same as U.S. citizens in all regards."

Grassley appears to acknowledge that fact in his letter to Ballmer, arguing
that the company has a "moral obligation" to protect U.S. workers. He did
not write of a legal obligation.

Microsoft will not disclose the number of H-1B workers on its payroll, and
it is hard to get a complete picture on any company's visa use from the
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, but Microsoft is considered a
leading H-1B employer.

From available department data, in two years alone -- 2006 and 2007 -- it
received approval for nearly 2,300 visas. In previous years, Microsoft has
hired foreign workers under the H-1B program, which has been used heavily
by technology companies since the 1990s.

The Washington Alliance of Technology Workers, or WashTech, a labor group
in Seattle, said it is trying to determine how many foreign workers are
being affected by the layoffs. "I know this is a secret they will try very
hard to keep," said Priyanka Joshi, a spokeswoman for WashTech.

Citing an Indian press report that says Microsoft is not laying off
employees at its India operations, Joshi said the move to lay off workers
in the U.S. and not overseas "is completely unfair." A Microsoft
representative could not be reached immediately to confirm those accounts.

Microsoft spokesman Lou Gellos said in a statement that the jobs cuts were
"based on a detailed assessment of our current and future business
opportunities."

"The initial reductions we announced affect employees in a number of
business units, and a significant number of the affected employees are
foreign citizens working in this country on a visa," Gellos said in the
statement.

He said the firm recognizes "the human impact that our workforce reduction
has on every affected worker and their families."

"For many of the employees here on a visa, being laid off means that they
have to leave the country on very short notice, in many cases uprooting
families and children," Gellos said.

Indeed, H-1B visa holders who are laid off face some difficult decisions.
As soon as the employee loses his job, technically, "you are no longer
eligible to be in the United States," said Kussin.

In practice, unemployed H-1B works may have a little bit of grace period,
possibly as long as 60 days, to find another job. The worker may have other
visa options, such as student visa for an advance degree. A visitors visa
is also possible, provided the applicant can demonstrate having sufficient
funds to support themselves, according to immigration attorneys.

But even if an H-1B worker is forced to return to his home country after a
layoff, he still has the option to return to the U.S. if new work becomes
available, said Sarah Hawk, an immigration attorney in the global
immigration practice group at Fisher & Phillips LLP.

For instance, if an H-1B worker has been in the U.S. for two years on a
six-year visa, that person can take advantage of the remaining time on his
visa to return to the U.S. to take a job, since he has already been counted
under a prior year visa quota, Hawk said.

H-1B critics aren't expecting Microsoft, or any other company, to cut
foreign workers first, but in Microsoft's layoffs they see a clear foil to
Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates' arguments that foreign workers are needed to
supplement the tech industry's labor pool.

Gates has urged Congress to eliminate the visa cap, now set at 65,000 plus
20,000 for advance degree holders of U.S. universities.

Norman Matloff, a professor of computer science at the University of
California at Davis and a leading critic of the H-1B program, sees great
benefits for opponents of the visas in Grassley's letter.

"If Microsoft doesn't state that they will lay off the H-1Bs first -- and
they won't state this -- then it would be awfully tough for Bill Gates to
come back to the Hill and urge an H-1B increase, wouldn't it?" said
Matloff. "In fact, Microsoft's refusal to lay off H-1Bs first would weaken
the effect of Gates' previous testimony."

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http://blog.seattletimes.nwsource.com/techtracks/2009/01/27/microsoft_layoffs_have_minimal_impact_in_china_no.html

Microsoft Pri0

Welcome to Microsoft Pri0: That's Microspeak for top priority, and that's
the news and observations you'll find here from Seattle Times technology
reporter Benjamin J. Romano, who has been covering the company for more
than two years.

January 27, 2009 11:49 AM

Microsoft layoffs have minimal impact in China; no immediate cuts in India

Posted by Benjamin J. Romano

Roughly 40 percent of Microsoft's 96,000 employees work outside the United
States. The company has subsidiaries in countries from Albania to Zimbabwe.
How are the layoffs announced last week impacting Microsoft's employees
around the globe?

It's hard to say exactly. The company is "not sharing specific figures that
break out US vs. outside of the US," a spokeswoman said via e-mail. But she
did confirm earlier reports that Microsoft's India operations had no
layoffs during the initial round of cuts that came down Thursday. China,
another important research and development hub for the company, was
"minimally impacted." The company declined to provide employment numbers
for its India and China operations.

Microsoft laid off 872 full-time employees at its Redmond headquarters out
of 1,400 job cuts announced Thursday, Microsoft's first companywide layoff.
That's about 62 percent of the total. Up to 3,600 additional positions are
targeted for cuts in the next 18 months, but Microsoft also intends to hire
2,000 to 3,000 people in strategic areas, making the planned net reduction
between 2,000 and 3,000 jobs.

The Economic Times, part of Indiatimes, quoted a Microsoft spokesperson in
New Delhi last week saying of the layoff, "It's not going to impact us. No
job cuts in India."

The layoff "will have little effect on its China region business and
employees," wrote JL McGregor & Co., a China-focused independent research
firm, paraphrasing a report in the Beijing Evening News that quoted a
Microsoft China insider. The same JL McGregor report noted that Google's
Kai-Fu Li told another Chinese news source that his company "will
definitely not lay off employees" in China.

The Microsoft spokeswoman noted via e-mail that "last week's decisions were
driven by a business strategy, not a geographic strategy."

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http://www.jlmpacificepoch.com/newsstories?id=140190_0_5_0_M

Google China Guarantees No Layoffs, Microsoft China "to Feel Little Effect"

Posted on Jan 23, 2009 | 20:01

Google (Nasdaq:GOOG) China will definitely not lay off employees, reports
Sohu quoting company president Kai-Fu Lee on Friday. The company is taking
steps to compensate employees for stock losses sustained in the financial
recession, said Lee. Previous rumors said Google China was preparing a list
of employees to dismiss and planned to make cuts after Microsoft
(Nasdaq:MSFT) China announced its layoffs.

Microsoft's (Nasdaq:MSFT) plan to lay off 5,000 employees globally will
have little effect on its China region business and employees, reports
Beijing Evening News quoting a related Microsoft China insider. The insider
did not disclose how many employees would be laid off in China. Microsoft
invested $280 million last May in a Beijing research center that was
expected to accommodate 5,000 and be complete in 2010.

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http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/News/News_By_Industry/Jobs/Microsoft_to_axe_5000_no_job_cuts_in_India/articleshow/4018523.cms

Microsoft to axe 5,000, no job cuts in India
22 Jan 2009, 2156 hrs IST, PTI

NEW YORK: Starting with 1,400 job cuts, software giant Microsoft will slash
5,000 jobs over the next 18 months.

"Microsoft will eliminate up to 5,000 jobs in R&D, HR, marketing, sales,
finance, legal, and IT over the next 18 months, including 1,400 jobs
today," the company said in a statement.

The layoff, however, would not be impacting the Indian operations. "It's
not going to impact us. No job cuts in India," a Microsoft India
spokesperson said in New Delhi.

In light of further deterioration of global economic conditions, extra
measures to manage costs are being taken, including the reduction of
head-count-related expenses, vendors and contingent staff, facilities,
capital expenditures and marketing, the company, which posted a 11 per cent
decline in profit for the second quarter, added in the statement.

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http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hTRob6LXiiLWNPqpGUhdfLWN7W
dgD95VP2Q81

IBM quietly cuts thousands of jobs

By JORDAN ROBERTSON 1 day ago

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) -- With the recession forcing tech companies to announce
thousands of layoffs, IBM Corp. is joining the fray -- but not advertising
it.

The Armonk, N.Y.-based company has cut thousands of jobs over the past
week, including positions in sales and the software and hardware divisions.
IBM says the cuts are simply part of its ongoing efforts to watch costs,
and the company won't release specific numbers, even as reports of firings
stream in from IBM facilities across the country.

Workers have reported layoffs in Tucson, Ariz.; San Jose, Calif.;
Rochester, Minn.; Research Triangle Park, N.C.; East Fishkill, N.Y.;
Austin, Texas; and Burlington, Vt.

Meanwhile, other tech companies such as Intel Corp., Microsoft Corp., Texas
Instruments Inc., Sprint Nextel Corp. and Google Inc. have all publicly
revealed job cuts as part of their strategies for riding out the economic
crisis. More than 20,000 jobs will be lost from those companies alone.

One of IBM's biggest rivals -- Hewlett-Packard Co. -- is also laying people
off. HP is shedding 24,600 jobs, nearly 8 percent of its 320,000-employee
work force, as it digests the acquisition of Electronic Data Systems Corp.

IBM says it doesn't have to reveal the number of jobs it is cutting, since
the Securities and Exchange Commission requires companies to disclose only
"material" events. And IBM considers its job cuts a regular part of the
company's business model, since thousands of jobs are cut every year but
are usually added back in other places.

Because of that, IBM contends it doesn't have to break out its layoffs in
regulatory filings unless it suddenly changes course and makes
substantially more or fewer job cuts.

That's why while IBM's head count keeps growing, topping 400,000 at the end
of 2008, laid-off IBM workers have flooded online job boards with
complaints about the company's stealth cuts.

One estimate of IBM's recent cuts put the number at more than 4,000 jobs
lost since IBM's fourth-quarter earnings announcement last week. Those
earnings contained an unexpected surprise: IBM forecast at least $9.20 per
share in profit in 2009. IBM shares are up more than 10 percent since then.

To get the cost savings that will help spur the higher profits, IBM appears
to have acted quickly. The estimate of at least 4,000 jobs cut comes from
AllianceAtIBM, a union that is affiliated with the Communications Workers
of America and represents a small number of IBM workers.

The Associated Press reviewed one document sent to laid-off workers that
identified some of the positions that were cut. Employees weren't
identified by name, but positions and the workers' ages were listed. The
document listed nearly 3,000 jobs.

In Vermont, IBM remained tightlipped about layoffs at its Essex Junction
facility, but state Labor Commissioner Patricia Moulton Powden said the
total number would be less than 500.

IBM recently employed 5,300 workers at the Essex Junction plant, down from
8,500 in 2001.

Jim Gallo, 48, who said he worked in IBM software support for 27 years, was
among those let go from that facility. Gallo, drinking a Grey Goose and
ginger ale at nearby Lincoln Inn on Tuesday, said he hadn't told his four
children yet.

He said he has until Feb. 26 to find another job in IBM, but he put his
chances at "slim to none." Gallo said he gets six months' pay as part of a
severance package.

"It's too bad they're not doing what they were doing before. They offered
some sweet packages for people to jump out," he said.

IBM's ongoing labor adjustments have led the company to add bodies in
cheaper and higher-growth parts of the world, like India.

In 2007, the last full year for which detailed employment numbers are
available, 121,000 of IBM's 387,000 workers were in the U.S., down slightly
from the year before. Meanwhile, staffing in India has jumped from just
9,000 workers in 2003 to 74,000 workers in 2007.

Associated Press writer Dave Gram contributed to this story from Essex
Junction, Vt.

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http://www.networkworld.com/news/2009/012609-minimal-asia-pacific-impact-from.html?hpg1=bn

Minimal Asia Pacific impact from 5,000 job cuts: Microsoft

By Ross O. Storey , MIS Asia , 01/26/2009
Sponsored by:
Microsoft Corporation says only a very small number of its employees across
the Asia Pacific, will be affected by this week's decision to cut 5,000
jobs from the IT giant's global staff.

Yesterday, the IT icon announced that it will cut up to 5,000 jobs in
research and development, marketing, sales, finance, legal, human resources
and IT over the next 18 months. The first 1,400 jobs will be cut
immediately.

Microsoft projected that the job cuts will trim its annual operating
expense run rate by US$1.5 billion and reduce its fiscal 2009 capital
expenditures by $700 million.

The layoffs are being implemented due to IT spending that fell lower than
the company's expectations for the quarter.

Related Content
Microsoft's website says the software giant's operations and logistics
centre is in Singapore and the worldwide Operations Group employs 10,166
people. The company employs 94,286 people world wide (at September 2008)
with an average age of 37 years.

There are 56, 654 Microsoft employees in the US and 35,567 employees
globally in their Sales and Marketing Support Group.

Single-digit job cuts

A Microsoft Singapore spokesperson said today: "I am unable to provide
information on how many employees we have in the region, or the breakdown
by function".

"However, I can confirm that the number of employees affected by the
immediate job eliminations announced on 22 Jan is a single-digit number
across Asia Pacific (excluding China, India and Japan)," the spokesperson
said. "I would stress that this number is very small and we are working
with the individual employees to assist them through this transition."

In the media announcement out of Microsoft headquarters at Redmond,
Washington, CEO Steve Ballmer said: "While we are not immune to the effects
of the economy, I am confident in the strength of our product portfolio and
soundness of our approach. We will continue to manage expenses and invest
in long-term opPORT 66,69,254,99,128,232