Time Inc. Cuts 289 Jobs

Posted on January 18, 2007

Earlier this week the New York Times reported that Time Inc. planned to lay off 150 people with half of the jobs coming from the editorial departments of Time's popular magazines.

Time Inc., the publishing division of Time Warner, is planning to cut more than 150 people, about half of them in editorial jobs across the company's best-known titles, like People, Sports Illustrated, Time and Fortune. The cuts follow about 600 last year, many of them from the company�s business side, and a decision to trim its roster by selling 18 of its roughly 150 titles.

Unfortunately, Ad Age reports the real number of Time Inc. job cuts is 289 -- almost twice what the New York Times had reported. Eat the Press notes that this is Time Inc's second round of layoffs in less than a month -- the last one came just before Christmas. Gawker has a letter sent to People magazine stringers as well as other memos. Editorial job cuts have been an ongoing trend in the magazine and newspaper industries.

Jane Genova writes, "Unemployment has morphed into an equal-opportunity disease. Writers, because we tend to be underpaid (at least as compared to management), used to be immune from layoffs. No more. Today, 172 of the 289 axed at Time Inc. were editorial folks. As a writer who was blindsided when I was canned in 1987, my heart goes out to them. They always need writers, we thought - wrongly."

While the New York Times article mentioned that the number of writers covering Britney Spears' antics and career may be reduced to just one, it is really the serious reporting that is getting axed.