Colorado Increases Number of Mass Layoffs

As it turns out, employers in the state of Colorado were more likely than those in other states to enter into what are known as “mass layoffs” in the month of September, when it is compared to the month before in the same state. These statics come to us courtesy of the US Labor Department’s Bureau of Labor Statistics.

While the difference, statistically, is only slight when you understand the defenition of the term “mass layoffs” you can see how this impacts a fair number of lives. A mass layoff is when a company lets go at least 50 of its employees in a single layoff.

As it turns out, this is not a long-term trend in the state of Colorado. In previous months things have been better, but not much better. The numbers for September showed one less mass layoff in August than in September, and one less in July than in August. So, in a nutshell, one hundred more people lost their jobs last month then they did in July of this year.

Of course, these numbers are meaningless if you want to know how many people were actually laid off. According to the numbers that were released by the Labor Department’s Bureau of Labor Statistics this week there were 10 layoffs that qualified as mass layoffs in the last month. This means that, at a minimum, 500 people in the state have lost their jobs in the last month in this manner.

Well, to be completely accurate 680 workers in the state of Colorado filed a claim for unemployment due to a mass layoff in the month of September. So, while the number could have been much worse, they still are not good. Compare these numbers to the national average and you will see that the state had a relatively small percent of the total number of mass layoffs. In total there were 1,495 mass layoffs in the month of September.

For those of you interested in the long term prospects of mass layoffs in the state of Colorado here is a listing of the mass layoff statistics from the recent months past:

September 2011: 7 mass layoffs of 680 workers.
August 2011: 6 mass layoffs of 547 workers.
July 2011: 8 mass layoffs of 704 workers.
June 2011: 9 mass layoffs of 708 workers.
May 2011: 10 mass layoffs of 1,171 workers.
April 2011: 15 mass layoffs of 1,750 workers.
March 2011: 5 mass layoffs of 557 workers.
February 2011: 4 mass layoffs of 383 workers.
January 2011: 11 mass layoffs of 1,126 workers.
December 2010: 14 mass layoffs of 964 workers.
November 2010: 17 mass layoffs of 1,379 workers.
October 2010: 17 mass layoffs of 1,675 workers.
September 2010: 10 mass layoffs of 827 workers.
August 2010: 5 mass layoffs of 355 workers.
July 2010: 16 mass layoffs of 1,552 workers.
June 2010: 14 mass layoffs of 1,237 workers.
May 2010: 10 mass layoffs of 1,024 workers.

Please note that the state figures are not seasonally adjusted.