Fast Continues, San Jose Mercury News Columnist Questions Corporate Layoffs…
2009 June 6
As janitors and supporters continue their rolling fast outside of Cisco Systems corporate headquarters in San Jose this weekend, San Jose Mercury News columnist Mike Cassidy has written a very thoughtful column about the corporate strategy of treating layoffs as par-for-the-course events that are the cost of doing business in this recession. Cassidy points to the disparity between this blase attitude, and the actual devastation that large-scale layoffs cause for people, families, and communities. He also rightly points to the hypocrisy of corporate executives, such as multimillionaire Cisco CEO John Chambers, who would never consider making cuts to their high-dollar salaries and compensation packages a regular business practice in lean times.
Kudos to Cassidy for questioning the corporate greeed that is rampant in Silicon Valley today.
We estimate that it would cost just a month and half of CEO Chambers’ salary – or a little more than $1 million – to bring back all 75 laid-off janitors to work for the rest of this year. Please stand with us as we demand justice for the janitors at Cisco Systems and stasnd up to all the corporations who are deaf to the kitchen-table concerns of Middle Class Americans today. Please bring a donation or just come by to show your support the fasting janitors outside of Cisco – 300 East Tasman Drive, San Jose, California, 95134.