California Labor Federation Launches Online Video and Game to Highlight Whitman’s Job-Slashing Corporate History

July 14, 2010 @ 12:08 PM

New Video, Game at www.WallStreetWhitman.com Illustrate Whitman's Pattern of Mass Job Destruction

San Diego -- The California Labor Federation today released a new web video and online video game illustrating the pattern of economic destruction Meg Whitman has left behind as she got rich the Wall Street way over the last 20 years.

“Meg Whitman has made a game of downsizing workers and outsourcing their jobs, and walking away with a very real fortune for herself in the process,” said Art Pulaski, executive secretary-treasurer of the California Labor Federation. “The record shows that Whitman is a one-person weapon of mass job destruction. By attempting to buy the California governor’s office, Whitman wants to take her game to the next level, but we can’t forget there are real lives at stake with every job she cuts, outsources or downsizes.”

The Labor Federation video – “California’s Future Isn’t a Game” -- was released online today on YouTube and on www.WallsStreetWhitman.com after its premiere at the California Labor Federation's Biennial Convention in San Diego. The video shows how Meg Whitman advanced her career at companies like Stride Rite, Hasbro, FTD, eBay and Goldman Sachs by firing workers, outsourcing their jobs, and profiting from now-illegal insider deals. The accompanying video game on www.WallsStreetWhitman.com enables Californians to learn more about Whitman's record and encourages them to share the information on her job slashing, anti-worker agenda using online tools.

"Our video takes a humorous approach to document Whitman's record of downsizing and outsourcing jobs, but let's be clear: her Wall Street Agenda for California is no joke," Pulaski said. "Under a Whitman governorship, schools, public safety and programs for the elderly and people with disabilities would suffer to pay for Meg’s tax breaks for millionaires and billionaires.”

Whitman’s proposals for California – like cutting 40,000 state jobs, opposing job-creating projects like high-speed rail and scaling back workers’ overtime pay and meal breaks -- show she plans to use the Governor’s office to further her Wall Street agenda at the expense of workers and their families.
Whitman’s pattern of mass job destruction is clear:

• While Whitman served as an executive at Stride Rite from 1992-1995, the company closed two manufacturing plants in Massachusetts and fired 450 workers -- and Whitman collected $568,000 in compensation and stock options. The Wall Street Journal reported that during and prior to Whitman’s tenure, the company closed 15 US plants, moving manufacturing to “low-cost Asian countries.”

• While Whitman served as president and CEO of Florist Transworld Delivery (FTD) from 1995-1997, the company eliminated 475 jobs and gutted retirement benefits for workers -- and Whitman collected $1.2 million in compensation and stock options.

• While Whitman served as an executive at Hasbro from 1997-1998, the company cut the workforce by 23 percent, laid off 500 U.S. workers and sent manufacturing jobs to Mexico.

While Whitman was CEO of eBay (1998-2007), the number of overseas workers at the company increased by 666 percent. By 2007, nearly 40 percent of eBay’s jobs were outsourced. By 2008, the company had laid off more than 10 percent of its workforce. Under Whitman, eBay repeatedly lobbied for increasing H-1B visas for foreign workers, who are often paid less and have fewer rights than workers hired in America. Whitman received about $500 million in compensation and stock options from eBay and charged the company and its shareholders nearly $3.2 million for the use of a company jet.

• While serving on the board of directors at Goldman Sachs (2001-2002), where she was on the executive compensation committee, Whitman doled out $79 million in executive bonuses and received more than a half a million dollars in compensation, along with insider access to new hot stocks worth millions, a practice called “spinning,” which is now illegal.

The video and online game are part of the Labor Federation's “Wall Street Whitman” campaign to inform voters and mobilize union members, volunteers, and others to spread the word about Whitman's Wall Street Agenda. For more information, visit www.wallstreetwhitman.com.

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Paid for by the California Labor Federation.
Not authorized by a candidate or committee controlled by a candidate.