US announced job cuts surge in March on Doge hit, recruitment firm Challenger says [View all]

Source: Reuters, via Yahoo! Finance

Reuters
US announced job cuts surge in March on Doge hit, recruitment firm Challenger says

Reuters
Thu, April 3, 2025 at 7:35 AM EDT 3 min read

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Layoffs announced by U.S. employers surged in March to the highest level since the pandemic recession as the government purged federal workers and contractors to slash spending.

Global outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas said on Thursday that planned job cuts increased 60% to 275,240 last month, the highest level since May 2020, when the economy was reeling from the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic. It was also the third highest monthly total on record.

About 497,052 layoffs were announced in the first three months of the year, the highest since the first quarter of 2009, when the economy was at the tail end of the Great Recession. ... More than half of the job cuts were in Washington D.C., reflecting the federal government layoffs.

Challenger said it had over the past two months tracked 280,253 planned layoffs of federal workers and contractors impacting 27 agencies. Another 4,429 job cuts were from the downstream effect of cutting federal aid or ending contracts, impacting mostly non-profits and health organizations. ... Tech billionaire Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, has taken a chainsaw to the public workforce as part of an unprecedented campaign by President Donald Trump's administration to cut spending and downsize the government.

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Read more: https://finance.yahoo.com/news/us-announced-job-cuts-surge-113529431.html

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From the source, Challenger, Gray & Christmas:

https://www.challengergray.com/blog/federal-cuts-dominate-march-2025-total-275240-announced-job-cuts-216670-from-doge-actions/

The Challenger Report
Federal Cuts Dominate March 2025 Total: 275,240 Announced Job Cuts, 216,670 from DOGE Actions

Published April 3, 2025
U.S.-based employers announced 275,240 job cuts in March, a 60% increase from the 172,017 cuts announced one month prior. (1) It is up 205% from the 90,309 cuts announced in the same month in 2024, (2) which was the highest monthly total recorded last year, according to a report released Thursday from global outplacement and business and executive coaching firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas, Inc.

"Job cut announcements were dominated last month by Department of Government Efficiency [DOGE] plans to eliminate positions in the federal government. It would have otherwise been a fairly quiet month for layoffs," Andrew Challenger, Senior Vice President and workplace expert for Challenger, Gray & Christmas.

Over the last two months, DOGE actions have been attributed to 280,253 layoff plans of federal workers and contractors impacting 27 agencies, according to Challenger tracking. Another 4,429 job cuts have come from the downstream effect of cutting federal aid or ending contracts, impacting mostly Non-Profits and Health organizations.

March's total is the third-highest monthly total ever recorded. The highest monthly total occurred in April 2020 when 671,129 cuts were recorded, followed by May 2020 with 397,016. It is the highest total for the month of March on record, since Challenger began reporting on job cut plans in 1989.

So far this year, employers have announced 497,052, the highest year-to-date and quarterly total since Q1 2009, when 578,510 job cuts were announced. It is up 93% from the 257,254 cuts announced during the same period in 2024 and an increase of 227% from the 152,116 cuts announced in the previous quarter. (Table 5)

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(1) https://www.challengergray.com/blog/job-cuts-surge-on-doge-actions-retail-woes-highest-monthly-total-since-july-2020/

(2) https://www.challengergray.com/blog/job-cuts-jump-in-march-2024-to-highest-total-since-january-2023-on-government-tech/