Hundreds of Illinois workers are now without a job, after Caterpillar eliminated 1,000 jobs at the Global Information Systems Department.
The layoffs were made public on Thursday, October 29, 2015. This is the first wave of cutbacks that have been made by the Central Illinois company. It's not specified how many employees in Decatur, Peoria, and other Central Illinois towns are a part of the layoffs.
About 5,000 jobs will be cut by the end of the year, with 10,000 employees laid off worldwide by 2018. The layoffs come just days after more than 2,000 workers elected to take an early retirement.