Bus drivers, who had about 130 lay-offs last winter, will be among those.

The lay-offs are attributed to declining market conditions due to the nation-wide slump in housing starts having reduced the demand for some of the products Sierra Pacific manufactures.

He writes that corporate layoffs received "a green light from Clinton," but he doesn't quite explain how a president could have given lay-offs a red or even yellow light (short of using the "bully pulpit" of the presidency and the incentives of awarding federal contracts to responsible employers, both of which Clinton sporadically tried to do).