At Disney, the layoffs impact domestic employees in its theme-park, cruise line and retail businesses. While two-thirds of the workers are part-time, the cuts also involve executives and salaried employees, the company said.
Halliburton Co., the world’s largest fracker, is eliminating an entire layer of management, while Marathon Petroleum Corp., the biggest independent U.S. crude refiner, has embarked on its second round of job cuts that will affect about 2,050 employees, and is targeting salaried positions at plants in Texas, California and Louisiana.
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With the pandemic still raging and U.S. lawmakers having failed so far to extend federal help for the unemployed and small businesses, many key measures in the world’s largest economy look set to remain weak for some time.
There were signs earlier Wednesday that the outlook may have helped revive stimulus negotiations, but Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi failed to strike a deal during a 90-minute meeting Wednesday and said they will continue negotiating.
U.S. airlines are preparing to lay off tens of thousands of workers starting Thursday unless they get additional federal aid. American Airlines Group Inc. has warned that it could furlough 19,000 employees, while United Airlines Holdings Inc. is planning to cut about 12,000.
There are signs, however, that the labor market is gradually improving in certain areas as demand rises from the depths of the pandemic. U.S. companies added 749,000 jobs in September, according to ADP Research Institute data released Wednesday. ADP’s numbers, though, have diverged widely from official government figures in recent months.
Indications the economy is recovering factored into Allstate’s decision to announce its job cuts Wednesday. The insurer held off on layoffs at the start of the pandemic.
“We waited a little bit until we could see that the economy was starting to pick up some,” Chief Executive Officer Tom Wilson said in a phone interview. “We could have done this earlier, but we waited a little bit to get ourselves aligned and to build a set of programs out which help people get new jobs.”
This article was provided by Bloomberg News.