January 15, 2007
Staff Cuts Seen, Severance Cuts Proposed
January layoffs to follow Time Inc.’s drastic job-elimination proposals
Nothing has been announced, but everyone’s reporting that Time Inc. will lay off many of us this month, probably within the next two weeks. The New York Post’s Keith Kelly wrote on January 5 that about 150 staffers would be axed, and on January 10 that the number would be 200. David Carr wrote in The New York Times on January 8 that there would be “significant layoffs at the magazine division.”
How many will survive?
On January 3 at the contract negotiations between the Guild and Time Inc., management’s outside lawyer said the Guild could look forward to employment for “as many people as possible” as a consequence of the negotiations. It seemed to be his polite way of saying the company wasn’t going to give the Guild anything it is asking for. The Guild replied that layoffs were imminent.
The lawyer’s evasive response to that focused on job cuts at The Philadelphia Inquirer, saying that if the Guild didn’t look to the future and embrace the “business model” that management is proposing, the employees at Time Inc. would face the same massive job cuts the Inquirer has endured.
This was the first time that any of us had heard the self-proclaimed “world’s largest media company” compare itself to a money-losing midsized newspaper, and it struck the Guild as disingenuous and dishonest.
Management’s strategy: Scare the employees so badly with layoffs that they beg for their jobs at any cost.
Setting the table for layoffs: Management’s severance proposals
The company is trying to save money on two fronts with its proposals:
In “Dismissals for Cause” (Article XX), it proposes to eliminate all severance pay! The employee would get only the meager “notice pay” that is listed under Section 3: 1 week’s pay for employees with less than 1 year of service, scaling up to a maximum of 4 weeks’ pay for employees with more than 5 years’ service. The previous severance-pay formula, which represented the bulk of the severance package, would be completely eliminated.
In “Reduction in Force” (Article XXI), it proposes to eliminate the “notice pay” entirely! Notice pay starts at 4 weeks’ pay for a newcomer, and it tops out at 24 weeks for a 30-year veteran. All this would be gone. In addition, the severance portion would be severely cut, to 2 weeks’ pay for every year of service, up to a maximum of 52 weeks (the current, very complicated formula starts at 3 weeks’ pay per year). In other words, after 26 years, all the rest of your work would earn $0.00 in your package under the new formula. Currently, long-timers continue to bank a minimum of a week of severance for every year they work, with no ceiling.
The special protections regarding automation layoffs would be ended. The current Contract provides for six months’ notice for employees in automation-based layoffs; the new proposal’s language is “as much notice as may be practical” – which could be none. The current three months’ notice to the Guild of the “anticipated effect upon the staff” would also be eliminated. Finally, retraining options for these employees would be restricted.
With layoffs a way of life for Time Inc., these proposals stand to save the company – and cost us – millions of dollars, even in the short term. And it could be your job that’s at risk.
The Guild severance proposals
The Guild, by contrast, proposes to increase the severance package in “Cause” dismissals from 2 weeks’ pay per year of service to 3 weeks. There would be no ceiling to these packages, whereas the current structure has a $17,000 ceiling for the 2-week formula, followed by 1 week’s pay for every year of service not covered by the $17,000 cap. As with the management proposal, notice pay would remain the same.
The Guild’s reduction-in-force plan would greatly simplify the formula and increase the payout to 4 weeks’ pay per year of service, with no ceiling. In addition to making the formula comprehensible, it would, the Guild hopes, cause management to think twice before launching massive cutbacks.
The Guild has also proposed to eliminate the requirement, put into the contract after a long, bitter struggle in 1999, that Guild-covered employees sign a release in order to get their severance packages. The Guild will explain the harm this requirement has caused in a future On Time.
Join the Guild!
If you’re worried about layoffs, there’s one thing you can do right now – join the Guild and show management that you oppose its layoffs and its severance proposals.
If you’re not worried about layoffs … you should be.
Contact Unit Membership Chairperson Alex Blanco (212-522-4187) or Local Guild Representative Bob Townsend (212-730-1532) if you want to join the Guild in its fight to save jobs and severance pay.
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1/15/07