SEATTLE — SEATTLE (AP) — Boeing has laid off hundreds of additional employees in Washington state and California as part of planned budget cuts that will ultimately reduce the company’s workforce with approximately 17,000.
Nearly 400 Boeing employees were laid off in Washington state and more than 500 in California, news media reported Monday.
The aerospace giant previously announced it will cut its workforce by 10% in the coming months as it tries to recover financial and regulatory problems and a strike by its engineers that lasted almost two months.
CEO Kelly Ortberg has said the strike was not the cause of the layoffs, which he said were the result of overstaffing.
In November, the company began notifying employees of their layoffs. Notices filed with state labor agencies showed the first round of cuts affected about 3,500 people across the country. The Seattle Times reports this.
Those cuts affected people in positions from engineers to recruiters and analysts and impacted Boeing’s commercial, defense and global services divisions.
Boeing has said most laid-off employees will remain on the payroll for about two months and will receive up to three months of severance pay, career transition services and subsidized health insurance.
“As announced in early October, we are adjusting our workforce to align with our financial realities and a more focused set of priorities,” Boeing spokespeople have said of the layoffs.
Boeing, based in Arlington, Virginia, will be there financial problems since two crashes of the 737 Max aircraft killed 346 people in 2018 and 2019. The company’s fortunes and reputation took an additional blow when a panel blew the fuselage off from an Alaska Airlines plane in January.