Layoffs announced by U.S. employers rose 8.2% in June from the previous month, turning higher after three straight months of declines, according to consulting firm Challenger, Gray and Christmas Inc. Despite the higher count of job cuts in June, the pace of downsizing during the first half of 2013 was down 8.5% from a year earlier to 258,932, thanks to a slowdown in job cuts during the second quarter. Last month, job cuts totaled 39,372, up from 36,398 in May and an increase of 4.8% from 37,551 a year earlier--led by increased job cuts in the computer and education sectors. For the second quarter, job cuts fell to 113,891, down 22% from the first quarter and off 19% from the year-earlier period. "The economy is picking up speed with housing and manufacturing staging comebacks," Challenger Chief Executive John A. Challenger said. "Threats to job security still exist, however, in the form of federal spending cutbacks stemming from sequestration as well as potential fallout from implementation of health care reform." "Right now, job cuts are on track to the have the second-lowest annual total since 2000," Mr. Challenger said. To date, Challenger said it has tracked 10,253 job cuts related to budget cuts known as the sequester and other federal spending cuts. The largest portion of the sequestration cuts have come from the aerospace and defense sector, which announced 4,366 layoffs from January to June. The computer sector saw the highest number of announced layoffs last month at 10,133, followed by the education sector at 5,629 planned layoffs. Write to Tess Stynes at Tess.Stynes@dowjones (END) Dow Jones Newswires July 03, 2013 07:30 ET (11:30 GMT)
Posted on: Wed, 03 Jul 2013 11:32:30 +0000
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