United
Airlines job cuts reflect economy
By Jack Schneider
On-line Forty-Niner
Airline
jobs are being slashed all over the country.
United Airlines announced that the company
would be cutting 1,250 reservation and mechanical
jobs. The company will close offices in
Long Beach beginning Jan. 4, laying off
96 employees.
By cutting jobs, United said that it is
expected to improve profitability by approximately
$120 million annually, according to united.com.
Cal State Long Beach economics Chairman
Joseph Magaddino said that the entire travel
industry has been decreasing in value for
quite some time.
“The industry has been in trouble way before
Sept. 11, Magaddino said. “There has been
a market demand that has been slow for both
domestic travels and international travelers.”
Already United has cut a total of 20,000
jobs since September 2001, deeply affecting
mechanics and reservations workers.
One of the issues regarding job cuts in
reservations is the use of technology instead
of workers.
Long Beach Airport spokeswoman Sharon Diggs
Jackson said that reservations could be
made easier through technology.
“Reservations are changing throughout the
industry,” Diggs Jackson said. “People have
access to the Internet and are able to book
flights online.”
One of the drawbacks of this technology
is the tediousness of work involved in scanning
data for companies.
“Most of the company no longer has people
reading and entering in data,” Maggadino
said. “A lot of data is scanned which
is tedious work offering low-scale, low-paying
jobs that still service tremendously in
productivity.”
Although United does not fly out of Long
Beach airport, the major airlines at the
airport, including Jet Blue and America
West, use electronic reservations, Diggs
Jackson said.
Throughout the travel industry, Magaddino
said that there is not a great need for
employees working in areas such as reservations.
“Part of the cut off is a lack of demand,”
Magaddino said. “They don’t need to pay
people’s salaries [because] they have been
replaced by the Internet.”
Maggadino also mentions that in order for
companies to be successful, generally the
productivity will be measured with fewer
workers.
“One issue with job cuts is that there are
going to be too few workers in the company,”
Magaddino said. “On the other side, if you
want to maintain output, with fewer workers
the company will generate greater productivity.”
On top of the issues of airlines getting
out of bankruptcy and low sales, Magaddino
said that when the U.S. economy is good,
the airlines do better in the
economy.
“When the travel industry is discretionary,
international economies are not doing well,”
Magaddino said. “Once the U.S. economy gets
moving, it will get the return of the foreign
travelers and the economy improves, and
travelers grow.”
|
