[Sixstrings]

Up to 19,000 employees of Washington Mutual face being laid off this weekend as JPMorgan Chase turns up the synergy on its recent acquisition. WaMu had about 43,000 employees as of June, according to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

http://www.forbes.com/markets/2008/11/2 ... ets19.html

[Daniel_Plainview]

Up to 19,000 employees of Washington Mutual face being laid off this weekend as JPMorgan Chase turns up the synergy on its recent acquisition. WaMu had about 43,000 employees as of June, according to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

http://www.forbes.com/markets/2008/11/2 ... ets19.html

That's only 44% of WaMu's workforce. Not bad for a weekend reshuffling.

[3aidlillahi]

Only 44%. To think that those employees never actually produced anything and shouldn't have been employed in the first place.

[Sixstrings]

Admittedly, this is not an outrage -- it's how capitalism *should* work. The twist is that taxpayers are throwing trillions at these private corporations, and they're still laying off, outsourcing, and investing overseas.

I'm all for capitalism, but just let it do its thing. If we have a Depression, the government should step in with trillions to build infrastructure and directly help the common man -- money should never be thrown at a failing business. Let them fold, let them consolidate, let them learn a lesson.

[ReverseEngineer]

Paranthetcally, I got a letter last week informing me the credit line on the one credit card I had, a WaMu Visa Card was cancelled. No balance on it, haven't used it in years, just kept it around for emergencies. Guess I should have charged it up buying more preps. LOL.

The legions of the Unemployed are mounting daily. Just what are all these out of work loan officers going to do? When will it reach Critical Mass?

Reverse Engineer

[nobodypanic]

I'm all for capitalism, but just let it do its thing. If we have a Depression, the government should step in with trillions to build infrastructure and directly help the common man -- money should never be thrown at a failing business. Let them fold, let them consolidate, let them learn a lesson.

infrastructure, eh?

Just what are all these out of work loan officers going to do?

six...can you really imagine a bunch of office workers, who've been sedentary for years, out building bridges and paving roads in the heat and cold?

[ReverseEngineer]

six...can you really imagine a bunch of office workers, who've been sedentary for years, out building bridges and paving roads in the heat and cold?

This is unnecessary with the advent of the internet. We will have Tele-Infrastructure Rebuilding Commuting, the workers will sit at home and rebuild all the roads from their laptops. This will save gas on getting the workers to the job site.

Inside of 1 year, on the books our roads will be completely rebuilt. The MSM will dig up archive video of a brand new stretch of road from 1995 and replay it endlessly to convince everyone that most of the roads are in great shape. Just if you happen to drive down a road in your neighborhood, your brand new plug in hybrid will disappear into a pothole the size of the Grand Canyon.

[Sixstrings]

six...can you really imagine a bunch of office workers, who've been sedentary for years, out building bridges and paving roads in the heat and cold?

What I'm talking about is make-work stuff. Point is to get money into the real economy -- send out stimulus checks if you prefer, but at least with infrastructure we'll have something lasting to show for the money.

For example, in Florida we could use a high speed rail connecting Orlando, the west coast, and on over to Miami. Would boost tourism (all those brits flying into Orlando could pop over to other cities), and if the trains were fast and nice enough, maybe people will commute farther.

Florida voters passed the high speed rail in a prop a while back, but we'll never scrounge the money for it on our own. I'm sure every state has some big projects they could use some cash for.

Like the old Tennessee Valley Authority and the hoover dam, the government could launch massive new energy building.

Infrastructure spending is simply another method of introducing capital into a deflating economy. The method we're currently employing is just giving it to the banks -- Bank of America used half its bailout to invest in Chinese infrastructure.

[GoghGoner]

I was thinking of WaMu recently and how many employees were to be terminated. 19K to start? Guessing there be a second round. HQ in Seattle. Not good for that city.

[Sixstrings]

I was thinking of WaMu recently and how many employees were to be terminated. 19K to start? Guessing there be a second round. HQ in Seattle. Not good for that city.

I think the article said the majority of layoffs will be in Seattle, though does that one city really have 19k wamu employees?

edit: re-read article, it does say "bulk of" the 19k to be in Seattle