Job Market Can Absorb AOL Layoffs, Officials Say

Loudoun County officials said last week they regretted the decision by AOL to lay off about 450 employees at its corporate headquarters in Ashburn, but they predicted that the workers would be reabsorbed quickly into the region's economy.

"We are saddened about the affected employees and their families. However, we are confident that they will quickly be able to find new job opportunities in today's market in Loudoun County and the region," said County Board member Lori L. Waters (R-Broad Run), who chairs the Board of Supervisors' economic development committee.

AOL, the county's largest private employer, will have a workforce of about 4,000 at its campus off Waxpool Road after the latest layoffs. In announcing the cuts Wednesday, the company said the affected employees would be let go over a two-week period beginning Feb. 15. AOL spokesman Andrew Weinstein said the workers would receive job-transition assistance and severance packages. Most of them had been working on efforts to sign up Internet access subscribers.

Weinstein said AOL also laid off a few dozen employees at the Ashburn headquarters in October.

Company officials said in August that they planned to lay off 400 to 900 employees in Loudoun as part of a move away from subscription-based Internet dial-up services and toward Internet advertising. AOL has struggled to compete with broadband service providers.

The good news for the affected workers is that they will be looking for work in a job market that remains very strong, county officials said. David S. Bennett, manager of strategic initiatives and communications for the county's economic development department, noted that Loudoun's unemployment rate was 1.5 percent in October, the most recent figure available.

That was a drop from the previous month's figure of 1.8 percent, and it was the lowest unemployment rate in Loudoun since January 2001.

The unemployment rate for Northern Virginia dropped to 1.9 percent in October, its lowest since April 2001.

Economic analysts outside the Loudoun government also have predicted that most of the local AOL workers being laid off would find work in the area, many getting jobs with federal contractors or competing technology companies.