Bob Collins
(Source: Mother Jones)
It was all so clinical. Just like that, 30,000 jobs were wiped away from Bank of America today when it vowed to save about $5 billion a year. If you’re “doing the numbers,” that’s about $167,000 saved for every job eliminated.
The bad news, which was anticipated, was delivered with typical corporate efficiency:
The first result of New BAC was the recently announced management reorganization, removing a layer of management and streamlining the company by aligning its businesses with the customer groups.
This reorganization follows on work that started in January 2010. The company continues to sell non-core business units and assets that don’t support its strategy, thereby strengthening the balance sheet, and improving capital and liquidity.
One of the people losing their job, however, is not Ken Lewis. He already has, largely because he thought it would be a swell idea if Bank of America bought Countrywide Financial back in early 2008 for $4 billion. It’s been a huge money-loser ever since.
When he was forced out some months later, he walked away with an $83 million “goodbye package” from the bank.
Somewhere, there’s a person wondering how they’re going to pay the mortgage, send the kids to college, and put food on the table when the unemployment checks run out.
That person is not named Ken Lewis.
