Tech Layoffs: Apple starts laying off third-party contractors just weeks after assuring job security
Apple dismissed hundreds of contract workers. Considering that the company’s CEO, Tim Cook, recently declared that layoffs would be a “last resort type of thing,” many people are surprised. When asked if Apple, like Amazon, Microsoft, and others, planned layoffs, the CEO said, “you can never say never” and added this qualifier.
According to reports, Apple dismissed hundreds of contractors, which are employees hired by other organisations but work on projects with Apple employees. Evidently, the company covertly sacked people in order to save money.
The impacted employees had contracts with Apple that could continue up to 15 months, but the company sacked them without waiting for their contracts to expire. According to one of the contractors, Apple had previously told the employees that their jobs would be safe, a promise that the company later broke.
In a recent press statement, the Cupertino-based tech giant boasted that it is “very carefully regulating spending and is cutting recruiting in certain industries while continuing to hire in others.” The most recent activity, on the other hand, paints a quite different story. Apple was the only company lauded for its resource management and for avoiding significant layoffs at a time when the industry has been undergoing layoffs since last year.
Because Apple does not consider contractors to be employees, job cuts for these individuals are not considered internal layoffs. Apple may find it easier to dismiss contractors since it will not have to pay severance or face legal action from former workers who allege they were unlawfully terminated.
There are presently no details on the overall number of contract employees employed by Apple, however numerous reports suggest that the amount is in the thousands. According to the cited source, Apple collaborates with hundreds of employment firms to assist with “project management, launch events, and even the production of Apple Maps.”
