Read our editorial on imperialist lies of economic boom here, and the prolonged economic crisis of US imperialism here.
UPS announced July 21 that it will temporarily closing its New Orleans East distribution hub as part of UPS’s “Network of the Future” streamlining campaign following a decrease in revenue since 2023. This closure will put 177 workers out of work starting September 8, with 164 being part-time and 13 being full-time.
A UPS spokesman stated that the hub will re-open sometime in 2026 after renovations, which means automation and few rehires from the current layoffs.
UPS’s 3-year “Network of the Future” initiative was launched in Spring 2024, aiming to cut costs through further automation and closure of facilities. Specifically, it seeks to lay off 20,000 workers—on top of the 14,000 layoffs already since 2023—and close 164 facilities by the end of the year while increasing automation at many of the warehouses that remain. UPS has seen a consistent drop in package delivery volumes since 2023 and is destroying its means of production to increase profit and meet its 2026 financial targets, seeking to increase its yearly revenue from $91 billion to $108-114 billion.
The initiative has failed to work toward its 2026 financial targets thus far; company revenue has decreased by about $600 million when comparing 2nd Quarter 2025 to 2nd Quarter 2024.
UPS has been amplifying their initiative in recent weeks, announcing the “US Driver Voluntary Severance Plan” on July 18, offering full-time drivers $1,800 per year of service worked at UPS as severance pay so that UPS can have a larger proportion of its employees within a lower strata of the working class and paid lower wages.
The Teamsters union, which represents about 75% of UPS employees in the US, has done and said nothing regarding the New Orleans shutdown, the latest in a growing list. The Teamsters brass have been speaking a lot but doing little in terms of struggling against the layoffs and wage cuts that come with the company’s plan.
This UPS initiative is a product of the imperialist crisis of overproduction, where the ruling class has produced more than can be profitably consumed, especially of the means of production themselves, and is carrying out a destruction of the productive forces in order to compensate.
Mass layoffs are hitting workers across the logistics industry—USPS, DHL, FedEx, and Amazon joining UPS in laying off a combined 100,000 workers in the last three years according to monopoly media.
In 2023 the unionized UPS workers were ready to strike nationwide, but were instead served a deal which sold out especially the part-time warehouse workers, who comprise the majority of the unionized UPSers, while including no contract language protecting against layoffs and weak language on safety and conditions of work.
Image: UPS Distribution Center in Arlington TX in 2020, USDA.
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