Non-Market Meltdown Layoffs Hit Silicon Valley

California State employment officials last month said that 1,417,000 people were unemployed in the state in August, up by 61,000 from July and by 413,000 from August 2007. By Thomas Claburn InformationWeek Layoffs are on the rise, in California and elsewhere. Some of the job losses can be tied to state of the economy; some of them have more to do with post-acquisition reorganization. On Thursday, Micron Technology to start doing so as soon as next week. HP said that the company's layoffs, which will happen over three years, are a result of its EDS acquisition and not a reflection of the current economic downturn. The company expects to hire about 12,000 people to bolster EDS's service operations as well as its marketing and R&D labs. Yahoo is said to be preparing substantial job cuts too, possibly in conjunction with its... [read full story]