Bob might be spot on with 150,000

My reasoning? Well I used to work as a contractor for IBM in Poughkeepsie, got 2 days notice in March that I wasn't needed anymore... Now work 45 miles away from home instead of 15 but make MUCH more and work for an infintely nicer Company!

Anyway back to the plot... The Poughkeepsie Journal has kept tabs on the lay-offs this year and the tally locally is 69 (Poughkeepsie is an IBM City with the Poughkeepsie plant and the East Fishkill 300mm fab as the major employers)

So 69 Blue Badgers got canned, but at the same time 1000 Contractors and Supplementals also got their pink slips... That makes it about a 14:1 ratio ... Reflect that Nationwide and you'd only need 10000 regular Beemer jobs to go and you would have the 150000 Bob mentioned...

Here is a link to the Newspaper article, the comments section is pretty interesting too!

http://www.pojonews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070531/BUSINESS01/705310341

Might be a case of the Bob bashers having to eat Humble Pie while Bob can wear his "I told you so" T-Shirt!!

As an aside I ran into a Blue Badge workmate of mine in the Supermarket last Sunday... He says the building we used to work in is a ghost town and the parking lots (which you used to have to get into before 8am to prevent a very long walk indeed) are practically empty...