I'm getting a handle on this credit crisis thingy

[Biggus Piggus]

nm

[Ash]

Can we not bring up telecom consolidation.. sort of a sore point. Especially the way that principals have twisted the reasoning for it in the media.

[SultanofSwine]

Elected officials want to stay elected and that means a focus on restoring "prosperity" to everyone. The fastest means for the gubmint to do that is re-open credit. Unfortunately, I feel like we will see a strong push that direction because the very facts BP hit on(prosperity by credit based consumption) is the EASY route. I hope somewhere among the idiots there will be those that will fight for moving this country back to prosperity from production otherwise we will shortly revisit the time of great fun we are all experiencing.

[HognotinMemphis]

I hope the fed gov't doesn't not loan any thing to the auto makers. But it is going to, I'm sure. They deserve to fail, the unions deserve to have nothing after years of being overpaid by a factor of 4 to 5.

How about moving on to new technology after relying on the combustion engine for over a century? How about improving gas mileage more than 10 or 20% in decent size autos since the first oil crisis over 30 years ago? How about realizing that the legacy stuff you agreed to pay to the unions was pie in the sky and wouldn't work for very long?

Idiots they are and idiots deserve to go out of business due to their failure to keep up with and use new technologies and sticking with antiquated business models. Pure dumbass.

[McKdaddy]

Feel free to rant Ash.  We're here to listen.  I just spent the weekend w/ a high school buddy of mine that's been at Alltel for a few years and he freely vented on several occasions.

[hydrophonic]

Me and a few coworkers figure the wages lost as a result of this at about 50 million/year on the low side. (think about it, 1000 jobs and most of them start at 38/year and go up quickly, by the time you've been there 3 years you are in the 50,000 range).

Not to mention the other businesses that will be effected.  Back in the late 90s, I worked in the IT department of an off-site document storage company.  At the time somewhere around 60% of what we were invoicing went to Alltel.  Most of us thought that losing the account would close the business.

[john c]

The analysts I asked say they believe Verizon will consolidate Alltel's call center operations into existing Verizon call centers.  Doesn't sound like anything will be left in Little Rock.  My condolences to all involved.

A friend owns call centers and he has been wanting to open an AR operation.  Perhaps we should give him a call.

[RazorHog14]

Yeah it's possibly going to be a sucky Christmas for us this year. I'm wondering what the world has come to when an MBA grad, with near a 4.0 gpa, working for a Fortune 500 company can't find a job...

[Ash]

I hear you. The job market in Central Arkansas is really in the toilet. Hopefully my department holds out until it starts recovering.

[Ash]

Towards the synergies of the deal. Verizon came to Little Rock a couple of months ago and told us they would keep the call center for now and that there would be 100 employees at the new regional headquarters. Almost all of those employees will be current Verizon folks. Everyone else will either be offered a job outside of the state or just plain laid off.

[RazorHog14]

I sure hope I get offered a job. At this point I would move wherever. I'm hoping that I'm not a "synergy." It's going to be interesting to see how this plays out with Verizon. I'm still wondering how their financing of this deal is looking to their shareholders right now.

[RazorHog14]

Yep knew this coming about a month ago. Makes the deal look less attractive for them. But I guess they really want to get it done. I always aspired to be a synergy and help cut costs. I'm wondering if it would be ok to put that on my resume.