Berkshire Has Shed 8% of Workers

Berkshire Hathaway, the conglomerate run by Warren E. Buffett, reported 21,000 fewer employees than it had at the end of 2008 amid a slump at its manufacturing and retail units.

Berkshire and its subsidiaries have about 225,000 workers, the company said this week in regulatory filings, which is 8.6 percent lower than the 246,083 employees it reported in its 2008 annual report.

Berkshire provided the jobs information in a document tied to its planned $26 billion takeover of the railroad Burlington Northern Santa Fe Corporation.

Mr. Buffett did not reply to a request, left with an assistant, for comment on the cuts.

Mr. Buffett, Berkshire’s chief executive, oversees more than 70 subsidiaries, with brands like Geico, Fruit of the Loom and Dairy Queen.

The company is based in Omaha. 

Profit at Berkshire’s manufacturing, service and retail businesses plunged by more than half in the first nine months of the year, and Mr. Buffett replaced the chief executives of two operating units whose sales suffered in the recession.

“When times are good, you’re going to have more people employed than when times are bad,” Mr. Buffett, 79, said this month in a video address to the 37,000 railroad employees that Berkshire will take on next year with the completion of the Burlington Northern takeover.

Mr. Buffett told shareholders at the firm’s annual meeting in May that he expected more cuts at Berkshire after reductions last year at Clayton Homes, which builds manufactured housing, and Acme Building Brands, a brick maker.

In the first three months of this year, Berkshire reported its first quarterly loss since 2001.

The firm returned to profit in the second and third quarters, helped by an advance in the stock market.

The Buffalo News, which is owned by Berkshire Hathaway, started the year with about 846 employees and cut approximately 100 jobs through voluntary attrition, said Daniel Farberman, the newspaper’s vice president.

Most of the cuts came on the production side of the business, he said.