Telecommunications company AT&T announced plans to eliminate 4% of its workforce (or about 12,000 employees) today in response to the economic slowdown. The layoffs are scheduled to start this month, and continue throughout 2009. The firm did say it would continue to hire in its cell phone and broadband Internet services portions of the firm, suggesting that the cuts will mostly affect employees in landline phone services. Since many AT&T workers are unionized, those who lose their jobs will receive severance in accordance with union agreements.
See "AT&T Plans to Cut 12,000 Jobs", The New York Times, December 3, 2008