When it comes to the world of layoffs there are a lot of factors that impact the jobs that are kept and the jobs that are not kept on the payrolls. Sometimes it is a matter of location. Other times it is a matter of what the company is going to be doing in the future and what operations it is planning to cease in order to cut its profits. If your company is a government contractor then their spending can also be impacted.

One of those contractors is BAE Systems and they are warning that if the current defense budget remains the way that it is that they will have to resort to layoffs, and possibly mass layoff actions. For those of you who are not familiar with the idea of a mass layoff action here is a look at how the federal government defines the term, “The Mass Layoff Statistics (MLS) program collects reports on mass layoff actions that result in workers being separated from their jobs. Monthly mass layoff numbers are from establishments which have at least 50 initial claims for unemployment insurance (UI) filed against them during a 5-week period. Extended mass layoff numbers (issued quarterly) are from a subset of such establishments—where private sector nonfarm employers indicate that 50 or more workers were separated from their jobs for at least 31 days.”

This is, as you may imagine, not the only defense contractor to take the stance that the cuts in these funds will lead to job losses, “It looks like the management of Lockheed Martin is at it again. The company is going to be cutting back on workers yet again, and this time the numbers are pretty serious. The company is estimating that they are going to need to cut about 10,000 jobs when all is said and done. The threats of job cuts come from a proposed action by congress. In the propose action by congress goes through, a $1.2 trillion set of job cuts from the federal budget as part of a plan to help decrease the federal deficit, then the company is threat of job losses is very likely to become a reality.” Though one has to wonder what would happen if the company would be willing to take a temporary dip in its profits in order keep those people in their jobs while the budget is in sequester.

Of course the government is laying off more then just sections of the budget. They have also turned to getting rid of their own workers. For those of you who missed it here is a look at job cuts to the US Postal Service that will get you up to speed in no time at all, “Well as it turns out the number of layoffs coming to the workers of The United States Postal Service will not be as bad as the management had initially predicted. On the bright side the service will not be laying off 20,000 people, but that does not mean that the news is all-good. The United States Postal Service is still getting ready to cut back on a whopping number of jobs. When the service closes 48 of its mail processing centers of the summer they will be cutting back on about 13,000 workers in the process.”