More high-tech job cuts

AUSTIN (KXAN) - More Freescale employees are being laid off this week and workers with Samsung Austin Semiconducter clocked in for their last hours over the weekend. 

Freescale won't confirm the job cuts, but sources within the company said many engineers were given their walking papers on Monday and Tuesday.

In February 2009, there were more than 500 jobs cut at Freescale.

"I worked for Freescale for seven years," said one employee who just lost his job and doesn't want to be identified due to his severance agreement. "Monday morning, I went in to my desk and sat down. And soon enough, my boss's boss came and got me with the HR people and informed me that I was being let go."

Freescale didn't file any warn notices with the Texas Workforce Commission, which means the current lay-offs may not be a significant number. However, it's a frightening new development for high-tech workers in Austin who are seeing their jobs sent overseas.

"The loss of jobs, particularly in this industry, is not something that everybody wants to accept," said Austin economist Angelos Angelou. "But, it has become reality. The industry is growing in Asia, not in the U.S."

Samsung also recently announced it was laying off more than 500 Austin workers.

The chip manufacturer plans to upgrade and combine its existing semiconductor fabrication plants to a single new facility. When it reopens in late 2010, Samsung will hire 185 new employees.

But with another rounds of layoffs in the semiconductor industry, Austin-based Workforce Solutions continues to be as busy as ever.

Nearly 850 people per day are coming through one of Workforce Solutions' three career centers in the Austin area.

The agency said the number of job seekers continues to remain steady in Austin, as many mid- to upper-level management jobs disappear.

The center's staff continues to educate people about retraining opportunities still available in the Austin area.

Workforce Solutions executive director Alan Miller said there are more than 40 training areas targeted by his staff to give grants and money for people that need to go back to school. 

Many of those include the health care and renewable energy fields.

Much of that funding comes from the Federal Stimulus Act. Workforce Solutions received more than $4.3 million to give to those recently laid off, as well as youth job training programs.

Meanwhile, in the Austin area, the jobless rate remained at 7.2 percent.

The state unemployment rate jumped to 8.2 percent in September and an additional 44,700 jobs were lost, the Texas Workforce Commission said Friday.

The Texas rate is still under the national unemployment figure of 9.8 percent, a 26-year high.

In August, the jobless rate hit 8 percent for the first time in 22 years. The state has lost jobs every month but one over the past year, and the number of employed people has dropped to early 2007 levels, according to state workforce commission figures.