Boeing to lay off more than 2,000 workers in Washington and Oregon

Boeing is slated to lay off more than 2,000 workers in Washington and Oregon following an announcement from the company saying it plans to cut 17,000 jobs, or about 10% of its global workforce.
The planned layoffs became known following a filing from the aerospace giant to the Washington State Employment Security Department. The department’s worker adjustment and retaining notification layoff and disclosure database says the date for layoffs will be Dec. 20.
According to the database, 2,199 workers in Washington will be impacted. According to reporting from Reuters, about 438 members of the Society of Professional Engineering Employees in Aerospace (SPEEA) received layoff notices last week.
Among these, 218 of them were engineers and 220 were technicians, Reuters said.
These layoffs come after a tough year for the company, which has been plagued with plane safety concerns and strikes in some of its plants.
In October, Boeing’s CEO Kelly Ortberg said the company planned to cut Boeing’s total workforce by 10%.
“Over the coming months, we are planning to reduce the size of our total workforce by roughly 10 percent. These reductions will include executives, managers and employees,” Ortberg said. “The state of our business and our future recovery require tough actions.”
Strikes and safety concerns have recently plagued the company. In October, workers in the Seattle area walked off the job for the first time since 2008.
The International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAM), whose members walked off the job had reached a deal with the company, ending the strike Nov. 4, but could now face layoffs.
In September, the National Transportation Safety Board issued an urgent warning regarding Boeing 737 planes, saying a piece of the rudder control system on these planes could lose functionality in cold weather.
Contributing: Reuters
Fernando Cervantes Jr. is a trending news reporter for USA TODAY. Reach him at [email protected] and follow him on X @fern_cerv_.