LABOR : Hughes Severance Package for Workers Not Nearly as Generous as the Last One

Hughes Aircraft workers who get pink slips won’t be leaving empty-handed, but they won’t be getting nearly as generous a severance package as their predecessors got two years ago.

In announcing this week the shutdown of its Fullerton plant by the end of 1995, Hughes said an estimated 800 to 1,000 of the 6,800 workers there would be laid off. The first wave of pink slips is due in about six weeks. Most of the other workers will be transferred to El Segundo and Long Beach, with some also going to Tucson and San Diego.

For those who are laid off, the company said it will provide 60% of their salary for four to 12 weeks, depending on length of service. That’s the equivalent of two and a half to seven weeks of full pay. Laid-off workers also will also receive company-paid health coverage for three months and up to $1,000 in tuition reimbursement. Additional federal and state training funds will also be available for Hughes workers.

Still, this severance package falls short of the unusually liberal package Hughes provided the 12,000 workers it laid off in 1992 and 1993. Those workers got up to 40 weeks of severance pay, plus six months of company-paid health coverage and up to $5,000 in tuition reimbursement.

“We don’t have the money to fund it like before,” said Hughes spokesman Richard Dore, noting that the company took a charge of $750 million related to the 1992-93 layoffs and restructuring. This time around, Hughes did not report any major expense for the companywide layoff of 4,400 workers.

Dore said that the new severance package is still far more generous than other aerospace companies--some of which don’t give any severance pay at all. And Hughes will give its workers eight weeks’ notice before laying them off.

The new severance package will apply retroactively to Jan. 1, meaning Hughes employees who were laid off earlier this year will be eligible.

And there’s one other benefit for everyone as well, Dore said: “We’re going to see if there are job opportunities” for laid-off workers in other divisions of General Motors, Hughes’ parent company.