The trillion dollar mandatory federal spending reduction
scheduled to start the first of next year, if Congress fails to come up with a specific
deficit reduction plan by then, could
begin taking their toll on employees of defense department contractors as soon
as this coming September in the absence of Congressional action. The mandatory
spending cuts are required by present law to come half from Department of Defense
budgets.
While Congress gave iteslf until January 1, 2013, to act,
employers are required by state and federal layoff notification laws to start
sending out pink slips to employees as soon as September of this year. Robert
J. Stevens, Chairman and CEO of Lockheed Martin, the country’s biggest single
defense contractor, “It is quite possible that we will need to notify employees
in the September and October time frame that they may or may not have a job in
January. … We may have to notify every one of our employees and all or
suppliers and subcontractors … and … start this huge cascding effect and bow
wave of contract actions. For us, the consequences of sequestration are real,
and they are nearer-term than some discussions that are underway today suggest.”
We can only hope our Senators and Congressmen realize that
their self imposed deadline of January 1, 2013 really means September 1, 2012
under layoff notifications laws they have pushed through in the recent past.
