Paypal Announces Slash Of 2000 jobs In A Bid To Cost Cutting; Morale Of Those Working In Tech Sector At An All Time Low; Google Workers Stage Protests Against Layoffs
Tech companies worldwide and in India are in for a major overhaul as they continue the route of layoffs as a measure to cut costs and increase profitability.
Hence, PayPal declared that it will trim about 7% of its total workforce, or about 2,000 full-time workers, as the digital payments company confronts what it calls a “challenging macro-economic environment.”
PayPal said that the fact that some of its organizations were affected more than others, it would make the cuts over several weeks.
PayPal is the parent of Venmo, Xoom, and Honey, among other brands; however, the company did not give any additional information on the same.
Based in San Jose, California, PayPal is the latest in the technology sector to cut its headcount. At the same time, Google, Microsoft and Salesforce took similar measures and announced tens of thousands of layoffs in January.
Elliott Management, an activist investor last summer, bought a stake worth about $2 billion in PayPal, which it said it had entered into an “information-sharing agreement” with Elliott “to continue collaboration across a range of value-creation opportunities.”
PayPal President and CEO Dan Schulman explained that over the past year, the company had made significant progress in strengthening and reshaping the company to address the challenging macroeconomic environment while it continued to invest to meet its customers’ needs.
PayPal Holdings Inc. is scheduled to report its quarterly results on February 9.
Meanwhile, the shares of the company have been down about 53% in the past year, although they rose 2.3% to close Tuesday at $81.49.
The leadership reaffirmed that while it had made substantial progress in right-sizing its cost structure and focused its resources on its core strategic priorities, it still had a whole lot of work to do.
Tech Companies Employees Bad Days Ahead
Those working in tech companies have been under severe stress and pressure as they hope that they will somehow be able to dodge the falling axe amid massive layoffs in the past few months.
Thus, morale is at an all-time low, and many as many continue to witness stressful and pressured environments.
What is even more stressful is that many employees reportedly find out that they were fired when their corporate login credentials ceased working or their work passes were automatically deactivated.
PayPal Doing Its Best
Schulman further explained his remarks that the sacked employees would be handled with the “utmost respect and sensitivity.” continuing, “I’m optimistic we’ll get through… with compassion for one another.”
According to Schulman, the company’s ideals “are around the fight against any type of discrimination.”
Although in the present, it is facing harsh criticism from several UK lawmakers after it temporarily stopped payments to Toby Young, an advocate for free speech, last year, the corporation has since altered its approach.
The layoffs ensued after PayPal announced a $15 billion share buyback scheme last summer in response to pressure from activist shareholder Elliott Management.
Furthermore, the business has been planning employment cuts since its stock price plummeted last year.
Intel takes Some Steps.
The world’s largest chipmaker, Intel, is taking a step different from other companies in an effort to save money without resorting to mass layoffs; it plans to stop paying its executives!
As per the word in the market, its chief executive would receive a 25% pay cut, and other top managers are also said to receive pay cuts of 10%.
All is not well – Google.
Google, the tech giant, recently fired around 12,000 employees this January; thus, several workers of the company staged protests on both US coasts this week.
The protests were held to call attention to labour conditions for subcontracted workers and support thousands of co-workers who were laid off.
While one rally was held at Google headquarters in Mountain View, California, another took place near Google’s corporate offices in New York City.
About 50 employees staged a protest in New York outside a Google store on Ninth Avenue, just minutes after parent company Alphabet Inc reported fourth-quarter results, including $13.6 billion in profit.
One software engineer, Alberta Devor, opined, “Today, Google has debunked its own rationale for laying off 12,000 of our co-workers. It is clear that the menial savings the company is pocketing from laying off workers are nothing in comparison to the billions spent on stock buybacks or the billions made in profit last quarter.”
The demonstrations were organized by the labour group Alphabet Workers Union, which doesn’t have collective bargaining rights, and whose members include Google subcontractors as well as employees.
Devor, who has worked at Google for more than three years and is an AWU member, said in an interview, “Today shows that some of the issues we’re talking about affect all workers regardless of what their actual job title or job status is.”
In California’s rally, several subcontractors spoke out against what they called substandard conditions, including what they said were “poverty wages and no benefits.”
Their tasks included reviewing content to help train the company’s AI-powered algorithms, as well as screening YouTube clips and searching ads for offensive or sensitive material.
However, according to the workers, their pay and benefits fall far below Google’s own minimum standards and benefits for its direct contract workers.
