December 1998 — 1999-03-23

In December 1998, there were 1,608 mass layoff actions by employers as measured by new filings for unemployment insurance benefits during the month, according to data from the U.S. Department of Labor's Bureau of Labor Statistics. Each action involved at least 50 persons from a single establishment, and the number of workers involved totaled 190,070. The number of layoff events was about the same as a year earlier, but the number of initial claimants for unemployment insurance was higher in December 1998 than in December 1997. The total of layoff events from January through December 1998, at 15,647, was somewhat higher than in the prior year (14,960), and the total number of initial claimants, at 1,747,338, was also higher than in 1997 (1,542,543). (See table 1.) The monthly series in this release covers mass layoffs of 50 or more workers beginning in a given month, regardless of the duration of the layoffs.