AT&T Sheds Thousands of Employees After Touting GOP Tax Plan, Giving Out Bonuses (appleinsider.com)

Prior to Christmas, AT&T and DirecTV gave layoff notices to a large number of landline, legacy service, and home installers spanning the country. "It is not clear if the firings relate to the pending AT&T and Time Warner acquisition, or how it specifically relates to the announcement that the company was giving $1,000 bonuses to 200,000 employees in commemoration of the tax overhaul signed just before Christmas," reports Apple Insider. Slashdot reader deadwill69 writes: Just more doublespeak after they announced their bonus program to justify the tax cuts. Seems they really didn't mean it after all. "Technology improvements are driving higher efficiencies, and there are some areas where demand for our legacy services continues to decline, and we're adjusting our workforce in some of those areas as we continue to align our workforce with the changing needs of the business," AT&T said in a statement to the Chicago Tribune. "Many of the affected employees have a job offer guarantee that ensures they'll be offered another job with the company, and we'll work to find other jobs for as many of them as possible." Let's hope they keep that promise. On a bright note: their service really couldn't get much worse?

Comments

Union had already negotiated bonus

[rminsk]

The workers union, Communication Workers of America, were trying to negotiate a raise of $4000 for the workers. The $1000 bonus came out of those talks earlier in the year. AT&T’s announcement comes one week after the company reached a new contract agreement with its workers. The contract came after a year of pressure from the workers’ union.

NOT THAT TIME WARNER

[EvilSS]

AT&T is trying to buy Time Warner the media company (Warner Brothers Studios, Turner Broadcasting, HBO, etc), not Time Warner Cable (TWC) the cable company which Charter already bought.

Just putting it out there before the inevitable posts about AT&T buying another ISP.

Re:Trickle down economics doesn't work

[110010001000]

Of course. And Trump has been running ads on TV "thanking him" from "lowering taxes". It was a plan that worked perfectly. Here is $2. Just don't notice I am taking $20,000. Trickle down economics does work though - it just doesn't work for those that aren't on top.

More conspiracy crap

[JustNiz]

The Cable/Satellite TV market in the USA is dying on its feet, thanks to the big companies refusing to be flexible and alternative services like Netflix providing better options for less. The layoffs are all legacy/TV related and simply reflect this.

Those two things aren't related

[rsilvergun]

to the tax cuts, any more than the bonuses were. The Bonuses were a hard fought and hard won victory by the Union that AT&T is taking credit for. What's more, they were a pyrrhic victory; the Union was trying to get pay raises but thanks to our shit economy for workers (which somehow posts record stock market wins every other day) they couldn't.

Similarly, AT&T isn't hiring because of the Tax cuts, their CEO admitted that already. They're hiring because they need workers. Again, Trickle down doesn't work. Businesses hire workers to meet demand. You're trying to put cart before horse. Giving the rich money doesn't increase demand because one person can only spend so much in a day.

You're deliberately twisting my words

[rsilvergun]

and you should be ashamed of yourself. Middle class and low income tax cuts are good. Both need relief. 62% of the tax cuts in this bill go to the 1% in the first 10 years. After that 100% go to them, since all the middle class tax cuts expire then.

Meanwhile we are borrowing money to give it away to the ultra rich. That borrowed money is being used as a threat to eliminate programs that benefit the middle class and working poor. It's a massive wealth transfer to the monied aristocracy.

You know this. You are far too intelligent not to know this. Why are you doing this? Is somebody paying you? Do you think the aristocracy is going to let you join? Do you have a rich relative that's going to leave you a fortune? Or are you just angry. Really, really angry. I get it. Life sucks. The job market sucks. But this is not how to fix it.