Layoff wave, hiring softens
- Multiple reports show a wave of U.S. layoffs announced this week across several companies and sectors. - Coverage lists firms including Lucid Group and Albertsons among those cutting staff this week. - Softer external hiring may temporarily reduce quits but can mask rising burnout and deferred turnover risks. (m.economictimes.com)
U.S. companies are still cutting jobs in April, even as national hiring data show a labor market that is slowing more than it is breaking. (bls.gov) Lucid said in March it would cut 12% of its U.S. workforce as the electric-vehicle maker tries to improve margins, and the company had about 6,800 full-time employees globally at the end of 2024. Lucid said the reduction would not affect hourly production workers at its Arizona plant. (economictimes.indiatimes.com) Albertsons has also been cutting staff after its failed merger with Kroger and a broader $1.5 billion cost-cutting plan. Trade publication Supermarket News reported nearly 400 Safeway corporate layoffs in Phoenix and Pleasanton, California, alongside a wider restructuring of Albertsons’ divisions. (supermarketnews.com) The national backdrop is softer hiring, not a collapse in payrolls. The Bureau of Labor Statistics said U.S. hires fell to 4.8 million in February 2026, down 498,000 from January, and the hires rate slipped to 3.1%, the lowest since April 2020. (bls.gov) Quits held at 3.0 million in February and the quits rate stayed at 1.9%, while layoffs and discharges were unchanged at 1.7 million. In plain terms, fewer workers are jumping to new jobs, and employers are adding fewer people from outside. (bls.gov) That mix can make the market look steadier than it feels inside companies. The Conference Board said the United States is in a “low hire-low fire” pattern, with openings down to levels last seen before the pandemic, excluding a brief Covid-era drop. (conference-board.org) Indeed’s Hiring Lab has tracked the same cooling in real time. Its 2026 hiring trends report said U.S. job postings slid through 2025 from more than 10% above pre-pandemic levels to barely above those levels by late October. (indeed.com) For workers, that means layoffs can rise at individual companies even when the national layoff rate is flat. A slower outside market also gives fewer employees a quick exit, which can hold down quits for a time without easing strain inside workplaces. (bls.gov) The next read on that strain comes with the March Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey, which the Bureau of Labor Statistics is scheduled to release after the February report published on March 31, 2026. Until then, the clearest signal is this week’s company-by-company cuts landing in a market with fewer places to go. (bls.gov)
