"UPS lays off 20,000 and closes entire hub location" Topic

UPS just laid off 20,000 workers due to a sudden reduction in package volume due to lower business activity and contraction.

And that is just the beginning. You are going to see many hobby stores close entirely along with multiple other industries.

Yes, this is very real. We are beyond the point of quoting fancy equations and terms we learned in Economics 101.

Here in CT where I live one of our largest companies near Waterbury canceled a huge chunk of their orders and are cutting back on their sales projections for the rest of 2025. I talked to an employee from there who heard some of the conversations taking place amongst management. What he heard was terrifying.

This is not "sky is falling". This is bad. People are losing their jobs. The economy is shrinking.

I was also talking to the owner of my favorite local hobby states the other day. He carries numerous wargames and hobby supplies along with also being a vintage comic book store. He went around and looked at the GW games and other brands he carries. He said that he is considering falling back on being a wholly comic book store because he's fearful of the supply chain disruptions from China for GW as well as what he'll have to pay to get GW stuff.

So his business will shrink.

This is real.

People need to relax. China's bubble is about to burst.

Baranovich,you should have done more reading on this. This is a direct impact of UPS deciding to scale back their business with Amazon, and the new contract with the Teamsters. You can sit back down and relax……

@jsmcc91,

We are 12% of China's total exports. 12%. WHAT bubble is about to burst? They have 6 billion other people to produce things for and sell to. More like our bubble is about to burst.

@Strosstruppen,

It was because of a combination of things. They were considering not doing depending on how things turned out. The tariffs were a tipping point along with the Amazon and the Teamsters. So sorry no.

Also, I find it astonishing that you gave absolutely NO REACTION whatsoever to the other two examples I gave you. I TALKED to ACTUAL people who told me what is happening with their small and medium-sized businesses. And that is being multiplied all over the country. And for you it's crickets?

And your arrogant response is to tell me to "sit back down and relax"????

Tell that to the people who have already lost their jobs. Or are trying to figure out to how to deal with higher prices and shortages which are already showing up in stores in the U.S.

Sit back down and relax?

China bubble about to burst? Sure. The prez said he expects China to come and talk in a few days, and China said: We made a contingency plan for the next 15 years. They play a looong game, while, on the other side of the Pacific, attention span is 10 minutes.

"The United Parcel Service (UPS) is expected to cut about 20,000 jobs in 2025 as a part of a larger plan to reduce costs and increase profit, citing "changes in the global trade policy and new or increased tariffs". UPS announced the layoffs on Tuesday in its first quarter earnings report.2 days ago."

That's a quote from a UPS representative, so I don't know where he's getting it from that the tariffs had nothing to do with it. The 20,000 are just a part of larger layoffs that have very much to do with the tariffs and decreased business traffic.

"Tell that to the people who have already lost their jobs. Or are trying to figure out to how to deal with higher prices and shortages which are already showing up in stores in the U.S."

I'm just curious…

Were you this angry back in 2020?
Were you this angry at the job losses in the previous administration?

If the answer is yes, then why can't I seem to find any posting you made of those on this site?
Hmmmm….

Baranovich;

This is also what happens when you move from a mostly manufacturing economy to a mostly service economy.

Baranovich,

Seeing how I know people who are in China, I may know more than you are talking about.

Not saying it's horrible or not, but I wonder how many businesses are going to use tariffs as cover to do what they where planning on anyway if something was amiss? It sucks for anyone getting wacked. I know I was pulling back on purchases before the election based on the economy, after all most of what comes delivered is toys. Was watching some videos on tariffs and such and one company was blaming tariffs when it looks like failed management is more to blame.

Striker,

They did the same thing with the international shipping pricing increases with containers. Used it as a reason to raise prices and charge more. Notice how packages are smaller but you pay more for less.

Just talked to a trucker friend at a local facility, drivers are being laid off in chunks because they simply don't have the volume to fill trucks. Their supervisors are saying that so far in 2025 this is the WORST year they have seen in a long time in terms of the lack of volume.

But HEY, sit back down and relax right? To quote the brilliant analysis a few posts up.

Yeah I'm angry. I do not like being told something isn't happening when it's LITERALLY happening all around me.

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Their headline:
"UPS to cut 20,000 jobs on reduced Amazon deliveries, as US tariffs weigh"
Amazon is adding jobs and opening new centers so they can do more of their deliveries themselves. That is taking away business from UPS.

The president can't fix 60 years of neglect of American business without some disruption to the economy.

The Chinese make more merchant ships that anyone else and dominate international trade and shipping.

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These things take time to correct, but I think the end result will be beneficial to the US and the West.

Mike

I guess you can get all out of sorts if you want. I was out of work for 9 months back in the early 90s because of the recession, 3 months in 08. Or, when our small business my wife and I opened in January of 08 just barely hung on in that recession. No one was crying about that, except maybe me and my wife. Right now I am busier than I have been in 7 years here at this job. Hoping it lasts till I retire in a few years. If not I'll have to figure it out. That's part of life. Sorry, I don't buy in to your gloom and doom.

@jsmcc91 I have family and friends in China, yeah they are not in that good of shape…..

Well then, according to some-- so it seems---China one way or another owns us and we must cow-tail to their every whim??
Russ Dunaway

" without some disruption to the economy. "

does a world-wide Depression count?

"Cow tail"???? Could you possibly mean "kowtow"?

We seem a long way from a world wide depression, we are not even in a recession. The employment numbers in the US are good and so is the inflation rate. Gas was $2.39 USD per gallon a few days ago. The president just announced huge budget cuts today. We are $37 USD Trillion dollars in debt right now, we have to do something or it will be time for bankruptcy. We spend more on debt service than we do on defense.
China has been waging asymmetrical warfare against the West for decades and we have done nothing to combat it. It's time we fought back, and I would rather it would be with tariffs than missiles.

Mike

Globalization has been unspooling for some time now. America no longer wishes to underpin the open trade World Order. We established it and maintained it to contain the USSR. The Russian Bear isn't the menace it once was. It can't project power globally. It can't even topple a 3rd rate neighbor without looking like an ineffectual bully.

China is on borrowed time. Many of the companies who flocked there in the 90s have already reshored to Vietnam, Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore. Wages in China have increased so much that Mexico is now cheaper, tho their employee base is less well trained. Whether China implodes because of their contracting labor force, hyper leveraged economy, or some suicidal misadventure in Taiwan, China's 15 minutes on the world stage are nearly up, tariffs or no. And this presupposes that the 3 Gorges Dam was actually built by people who could carry the 3.

The only constant in the world economy is change. Even if we had elected Skippy the Wonder Horse last year, we'd be eyeball to eyeball with a world economy going thru a messy reset.

Doubt and worry are healthy things. They're how we figure out what our motivated self interest consists of. If we could figure out how to stop antagonizing Canada and Mexico and cultivate a SANE and CONSISTENT immigration policy, we'd be fine as frogs hairs.

I'd like to think we'd be willing to exert influence on the world stage to avoid another 1917/1941 "break glass in case of emergency" situation, but I guess we'll see.

To quote M*A*S*H, "Boys and Girls, take my advise. Pull down your pants, and slide on the ice."

I don't have a dog in this fight, but I don't get some of the tariff arguments. How can a free trade agreement be made fairer. I genuinely don't see how it can be.

Blue and Red have no trade barriers up against one another. No tarrifs. No quotas. No import limits. Blue wants to increase its' production of farkles. Red makes lots and lots of farkles, selling them worldwide.

To encourage farkle production, Blue gives $$$ to its farkle factories to increase production. Because of its' subsidies, Blue farkles cost less than Red farkles on the world market, reducing Red's market share.

Red farkle factories fume. They demand assistance. Red establishes protections to keep Blue farkles out of the Red market.

Unregulated markets aren't always "fair."

America doesn't grow coffee. It's more efficient to grow it elsewhere and import it. There is a rough logic to wanting us to grow our own, but the only suitable growing locations are on the high slopes of California and Hawaii. Can you guess the odds that either state will want to plough under natural vegetation for coffee growing? It takes 4 years for new fields to produce.

I doubt Starbucks would survive trying to sell Chicory Macchiattos, but we do grow that in Nebraska.

"We seem a long way from a world wide depression, we are not even in a recession."

Yet.

Cloud Cuckoo Land is a lovely place to live in. until it's not.

I see FedEx trucks several times a day and almost never see UPS trucks.

Deliveries are being made, but not by UPS as much as they used to.

Perhaps an issue or issues at UPS?

Connecticut. Got it.

17 billon in tariff revenue first quarter.

I generally don't weigh in on economic discussions because it is a topic I really don't know anything about. That said, CFeicht makes an interesting point. The fact that UPS is not moving freight does not mean that freight is not moving. I see UPS vans on occasion. I see Amazon vans virtually every day. I don't know what that means in the big picture, but a lot of packages are being delivered.

Seeing that I was a survivor of this industry, there is a big reason for this. Amazon gives UPS (FedEx and USPS) the crap. In deliveries the more condense an area, the more money you make since your costs are so much lower. What Amazon has done is give all the crap (think rural routes) to UPS and USPS. The USPS is hemmoraging money because of this relationship. The bosses think because of volume they are making money. But, rural route carriers are not designed to run back to the post office 3-4 times a day to pick up more packages. Hence the costs are going up and none of the rural route carriers are making any money. I have listened to one of the conference calls and talked to the local post master. Their boss will not listen. So, in a business sense it is better for UPS to cut their loses. Yes, that means cutting labor. I saw it happened with FedEx with a big customer that demanded high service with little to not profit. FedEx eventually said this is stupid and dropped the customer (not Amazon but a large mail order clothing company).

All good here in Texas – not looking so good for you in the liberal NE USA. No tariffs on my Old Glory 25mm and Blue Moon 15mm figures.

Economics bores me so looking for an answer from some who might know. What if most favored status was removed from china vs tariff war?

Gas was $2.39 USD USD per gallon a few days ago.

it's enough to make you cry. You read in the papers over here this week about jobs in the USA paying 3 times what we earn in the UK, and that $2.39 USD / gallon equates to £1.80 GBP, we hit £2.00 GBP / gallon back in 1990/1991 and it's been going up ever since. These days it's about £6.00 GBP/gallon, and you guys are crying about how hard up you are in the US?

Tariff revenue first quarter comes from the fees paid by the importers (not the exporters). First question I have is where does that money go? Money must go to the government who imposed the tariff? So the importer can pay the tariff to the government and that's that?? Maybe? But likely not. How will the importer get reimbursed?

So am thinking the importer then sells the product to the folks who then buy from the importer. OK, so they pay for the tariff. They might choose to accept the financial hit? End of subject? Likely not. If they pass the tariff onto the product buyers, then the manufacturer or distributor or store or internet seller has to pay the tariff. Again, they may just eat the cost? How can they stay in business? So, likely the cost gets passed on to me and you. WE are in this together. You and I, WE, pay the tariff. How can that be called tariff revenue? We are paying extra money for whatever we are buying that has a tariff attached to it.

What happened to the tariff money collected at the port? Where did that go? Our government??? To do what??? I sure hope they spend it wisely….

Now I'm above my paygrade. In the meantime we are ALL in the same boat. I say we row together.

Can anyone provide some explanation/context about what torokchar is on about?

Color me perplexed/befuddled.

UPS is heavily investing in automation which is probably to blame (at least in part) for the facility closures.

Teamsters leadership thought they had the upper hand. It would appear that they do not…

"Ups is thinking years ahead all this automation has been planned for a long time. They agreed so fast on the greatest contract ever because they knew layoffs were coming and buildings were going to close"

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I'm retired. The value of my stocks and bonds in my retirement fund dropped $137 USDK between December 2024 and April 2025. That's a direct result of the market volatility and the loss in value of the USD caused by the tariffs and the loss in confidence in the US as a trading partner. I was okay with the idea of tariffs targeted on strategic materials (steel, aluminum, rare earth materials) that our adversaries could cut us off from. Not so much the sweeping mess we see now – I don't care if China make my tennis shoes. I live in TX too, and I'm not a liberal, but I'm certainly not happy with what's happening.

I was an Architect before I retired. You can't design and build a factory in less than three years. You will likely have to import the machinery you plan to produce your product with, and good luck finding skilled labor, or really any domestic labor, interested in working a drudge job in a factory. But no one is going to build any factories, because people will get fed up and vote the current crop of politicians out and we'll be back to importing everything again.

Hey everyone,

Do a Google search for "Wisconsin model railroad company worried about future".

I just watched it on Youtube. And it's not just this one store that's worried about the tariffs. THE ENTIRE MODEL RAILROAD industry is concerned about tariffs because it's going to make it near impossible to be able to buy any new inventory.

WHY? Because 95% of what they have in their stores for products are made in CHINA. That big, bad Communist country that we love to pretend is a threat to world security, when the fact is they make practically every single thing our culture buys when it walks into a Walmart, Target, Lowes, or local hobby store. Yes, we do have some dedicated hobby companies here in the U.S. like Woodland Scenics and others. But the point is that most model railroad engines and cars, as well as plastic model buildings, etc. are made largely in China.

Yeah, it's not subtle. These f'n insane tariffs imposed by this insane excuse for a president is going to destroy thousands of hobby stores, model railroad and otherwise.

BUT HEY, "sit back down and relax" right?

And yes, as Gear Pilot said perfectly above. Tariffs CAN work if they are TARGETED and actually accompanied by a real policy or set of policies. You have to impose them in conjunction with actual industrial POLICY that boosts the industries that you would like to actually return to your country!

And I would also like to point out that Biden's CHIPS Act was doing exactly that! It was poised to create about 150,000 new jobs in the chip sector for America. And it was implemented with the idea of supporting the sector to help it grow.

THAT is how you can do targeted tariffs on something and also have a strategy to create new jobs in a new industry, or boost an existing industry.

AAANNNNNNNND take ONE guess who shut the CHIPS Act down within the first MONTH of taking office.

@ Gear Pilot

You have my sympathies. I truly hope some sort of sanity will prevail, a reversal & a Mea Culpa announced & at leat some of the damage repaired.

Were you this angry back in 2020?
Were you this angry at the job losses in the previous administration?

The Biden administration oversaw a net gain of approximately 16.6 million jobs, with the most significant losses occurring in specific sectors like small businesses and manufacturing. However, these losses were relatively minor compared to the overall employment gains during his tenure.

At the conclusion of President Joe Biden's term in January 2025, the U.S. economy exhibited several positive indicators:

Gross Domestic Product (GDP): In the fourth quarter of 2024, real GDP increased by 2.4%, reflecting steady economic growth during the final months of Biden's presidency.

Unemployment Rate: The unemployment rate stood at 4.0% in January 2025, indicating a robust labor market.

Inflation: The Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE) price index, a key measure of inflation, increased by 3.6% in the first quarter of 2025, up from a 2.4% increase in the previous quarter.

However, it's important to note that these figures also reflect the early impacts of policies implemented by the incoming administration. For instance, the contraction in GDP during the first quarter of 2025 was largely attributed to a surge in imports ahead of newly imposed tariffs, which are subtracted in GDP calculations, and a decrease in government spending.

In summary, President Biden left office with the U.S. economy demonstrating solid growth, low unemployment, and moderate inflation, although early 2025 data began to reflect the effects of policy changes introduced by the succeeding administration.

Were you this angry at the job losses in the previous administration?

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You can ignore all of that, of course, because, as Stephen Colbert reminded us, "Reality has a well-known liberal bias."

Oberlindes Sol LIC – I reasd the articles you limnked and thought this summary, from your Forbes link, the most factual.

Contra
It's indisputable that unemployment declined significantly and employment and pay both rose to record levels during Biden's presidency. But when you factor out a global pandemic, the picture becomes less favorable. Unemployment is higher than the 3.5% jobless rate at the beginning of Trump's final year, in February 2020, before covid lockdown orders ravaged the labor market. The total number of American workers in December 2024 is up only 5% from February 2020, far less than the headline 12% worker growth during Biden's presidency. And the labor force participation rate is still well below its 63.3% level in February 2020, continuing a decades-long downward trend. "Covid is weird, and it makes comparisons weird," Martha Gimbel, formerly a senior member of Biden's Council of Economic Advisers, told Politico last year.

Inflation Cut Into The Impact Of Wage Gains
The fruits of higher pay were offset by inflation. The government's consumer price index increased by 20.8% from December 2020 through November, slightly outpacing the pace of pay increases.

In addition, looking at the U-6 stat from the BLS, the unemployment and under-employed rate increased from the mid 6.% range in mid 2022 , to 8.% in Dec. 2024. The employment figure of 135.9 million is a U-3 figure, where everyone working is fulltime – so, no such thing as parttime and if you are unemployed more than 26 weeks – you don't exist.
You likely remember July 2022 – the administration, the Treasury Secretary and the Federal Reserve Chair were all telling us inflation was transitory, after which inflation increased to 9.9% annualized?
Lastly, no one knows if migrants got the newly created jobs, as the BLS doesn't ask and business doesn't tell.

Ober/Old C,
I work in an industry DIRECTLY tied to the tariff issue, so I have grave concerns about the outcomes, both professionally and personally. I'd say that while I definitely would like to see the current world economic structures re-written to benefit the American employee (while hopefully not taking bread out of the mouths of other nations' producers), the route taken has been "poor." We may have common ground there…

That being said, AGamer points out some fallacy in the evaluations that you are positing; I'll shed a little more:

First off, the job "increases" over the Biden presidency where overwhelmingly of two sources:
-Re-employment of previously lost jobs during the Covid "pandemic." Note that job losses (although generally temporary) were greatest in areas where Biden's political party held the most sway as they tended to have the most draconian (and overwhelmingly unscientific) responses to the pandemic…
-Massive government hiring. As Old C tentatively touches, private sector job growth in the last four years was anemic (actually almost non-existent) at best, while state and federal job hiring continued at a record pace. Note that government jobs are net losses in the long term to the economy. They produce little to no tangible goods, and outside of defense, almost no services except regulation which overwhelmingly leads to redistribution of wealth, which is a net tax loss to the private sector and economy as a whole.

In sum: Biden oversaw nor created any real job growth in the private sector and the only significant job growth was in the public sector, a net loss to the economy as a whole.

Secondly, the inflationary spiral that was dropping off at the end of the Biden term was started….by Biden's own party's policies reflected in one major thing: massive government spending. As basic economics tells us: inflation is a direct result of poor government monetary policy. Temporary reductions in goods coupled with mass federal printing of money=inflation. It began to cool only because the flow of goods returned to normal, and prices have not yet (or likely will) drop to pre-pandemic levels.

In sum: Biden party policies exacerbated the inflationary spiral, and it cooled as a result of market forces, not government policy.

Third, the unemployment rate of over 4% started to rise before last summer, and is today the same as it was last July, well before Trump took office.

Sum: there is not yet any definitive proof that Trump's policies have had any negative (or positive) effect on the job market.

Finally, the inflation rate in February and March is still equal to or lower than the average for CY2024.

Sum: there is not yet any definitive proof that Trump's policies have had any negative (or positive) effect on the job market.

Could all this change to the negative from Trumpian policies: while I hope not, it absolutely could, but we, unfortunately are in a "wait and see" effect.

So many experts.

Y'all should go work for the government.

"Experts" etc.

A perjorative? You're maligning people for having knowledge??

I think it's about having a good education & understanding basic economics.

I could recommend a few 'primers' for you to read if economics is too hard for you?

Interesting that you think I don't like experts. Lack of listening to experts is what's gotten us in this rather precarious position. Same as over the pond with brexit where the ignoring of ‘so called experts' led to them leaving the EU which has caused a lot of economic damage.

I like experts but generally only those that are proficient and recognised in their fields.

I'm certainly not one. Of anything.

It's always good to conclude on an amicable note, so I'll write that I certainly agree with your final sentences.

+1 AGamer.

I think one can support what the Trump administration is trying to do while rejecting how they are going about it. The idea that one can unwind 40+ years of world wide economic integration in a few months really verges on lunacy. What is required is a long term systematic and strategic plan that reflects a broad bi-partisan consensus. Unless Trump makes a huge course correction we are going to get is an unnecessary economic crisis. And I think that is Baranovich's basic point.

+1 Marcus, well said.