Most any day here, theres a post or two (at least) that question how Hyde Park has changed. In looking at several articles on the Hudson Valley Magazine site, I ran across the most concrete evidence of how the early 1990s IBM downturn impacted the entire region. Just look at the numbers they site: IBM Layoffs 1990s For decades, IBM’s plants in Dutchess and Ulster counties shaped the local economy, employing thousands of workers and bestowing financial security on them and their families. By 1985, the company provided 60 percent of Dutchess’s manufacturing jobs and 20 percent of the county’s overall employment. But the good fortune did not last, as the firm suffered a five-billion-dollar loss in 1992, resulting in thousands of layoffs. Where the Poughkeepsie, East Fishkill, and Kingston locations had employed 31,042 people in 1985, a scant 10 years later, that number sank to 10,100. The cuts pulled Dutchess unemployment up to a whopping 11.2 percent in 1993. Floundering without their income and their corporate identity, former employees had to redefine themselves — and the area’s economic system.
Posted on: Mon, 15 Dec 2014 21:10:02 +0000
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