The logic follows that if having to layoff staff is considered a bad thing, then having more of them occur must be even worse. So, we can safely say that during the 2011 year things got worse for the workers who live in the state of Wisconsin. The bad news in this case has no good news to go with it; in 2011 there were more layoffs instated by companies than were let go at the same point the year before. So basically, there were more layoffs for workers in all of 2011 than there were in all of 2010. While this jobs numbers only encompass from Jan 1st to Dec 29th 2010 and Jan 1st to Dec 29th2011, they are still a fairly accurate measures of the layoffs for the year.

According to data that was released by the Wisconsin state Department of Workforce Development the number of mass layoff actions went up by 16 actions in 2011. To put that in concrete terms there were 71 mass layoff events in the state in 2011 and 87 of them in 2011. For those of you who are not familiar with the term is, or did not catch our earlier coverage a mass layoff action is defined as the following:

“…the Bureau of Labor Statistics reports religiously a mass layoff is defined as a layoff where more than 50 workers were let go by a single employer at one time in any given state. So if your job released 25 people in D.C., 30 in Philly and 10 in NYC, even if it was on the same day, it does not count in this report.”
So, with 87 mass layoff actions on the books that means that at a bare minimum 4350 are out of a job in that state alone. Actually, the numbers in real jobs lost dropped when you look at the numbers added up. In 2011 the state estimates that 6,798 workers were let go in these mass layoff actions, as opposed to the 6,945 from 2010. While this number does mean that 147 fewer people are out of a job this information does not include the 2011 layoffs related to the closure of a Sears store in West Baraboo.

If one were to delve not to much farther back into the available data, as recently as 2009, these current layoff numbers would seem tame by comparison. In 2009 the Wisconsin state Department of Workforce Development estimated that the state lost about 19,000 jobs in mass layoffs action and plant closures.

While that may seem like some very good news you have to bear in mind that many workers who were laid off in 2009 and 2010 are still in search of new jobs. So every time a new bout of layoffs comes around, and a new round of workers enter into the job market, things get tighter for all of the job seekers out there.

In addition many of the workers who have managed to find work are doing so at a lower pay rate, and have to take on multiple jobs in order to make ends meet and afford to stay in their homes.