[Congressional Record Volume 155, Number 17 (Wednesday, January 28, 2009)]
[House]
[Page H752]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                     FEDEX: SETTING A GREAT EXAMPLE

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Cohen) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. COHEN. In the Tuesday newspapers and the Tuesday news, we had the 
distressing report that corporate giants, major corporations, had 
slashed over 70,000 jobs in America. This type of action, where 7,000 
people lost their jobs at American Express and Home Depot--up to 53,000 
people at Citigroup lost their jobs over the last few years--have 
caused great distress to many citizens. We've got more unemployed, 
going over 7 percent now.
  But these job cuts aren't absolutely necessary to be made. Employment 
is disappearing from every job sector, from home building to mortgages, 
finance to banking, manufacturing to retail. The toll on the economy 
and on individuals has substantially worsened. And as President Obama 
stated in his inaugural address, our economy is badly weakened, the 
challenges we face are real, and they will not be met easily or in a 
short span of time.
  We took action today, and we will take additional action to try to 
help the people who are unemployed with additional unemployment 
compensation and health care and whatever other benefits we can help 
with.
  But a particular industry in my community of Memphis, Tennessee, the 
lead corporate citizen, Federal Express, has set an example that I wish 
the other corporate leaders that have cut so many jobs recently and 
have cuts in the past would follow. Fred Smith of Federal Express chose 
not to hurt people, but to take the cut as a group. They chose to have 
benefits and pay cuts rather than additional layoffs. With 14,000 
salaried employees in Memphis and 36,000 worldwide, they decided each 
of these people would see a 5 percent pay cut.

                              {time}  1845

  They could have easily just cut 5 percent off the payroll, 5 percent 
of the people. But instead they kept all of those employees and had 
them all share the burden of a 5 percent pay cut.
  The executives of Federal Express will take a pay cut of 7.5 percent. 
And the president, chairman, and CEO, Frederick W. Smith, will take a 
20 percent cut in pay.
  This is the type of leadership that I wish other corporations would 
look at, follow, and emulate, and spare their employees the loss of a 
job and instead share it throughout the corporate ranks.
  This follows the $1 billion in cost reductions already in place at 
Federal Express, from executive bonus suspensions to personnel 
reductions at FedEx Freight and FedEx Office. In total, the company is 
cutting costs by approximately $800 million over the next 18 months 
without having to resort to layoffs.
  I want to commend FedEx Chairman and CEO Frederick W. Smith for 
seeking other cost-cutting alternatives first and finding ways to help 
hardworking Memphis and other citizens around the world who work for 
FedEx keep their jobs. One can see easily why FedEx has been a leader 
in business creativity for over 30 years, has made the Fortune Magazine 
list of ``100 Best Companies to Work For'' in 11 of the past 12.
  Fred Smith and Federal Express are leaders in corporate America. 
They're leaders in my community. And I hope that corporate America will 
look to them for their leadership. We cannot afford to have increasing 
unemployment rates, and as we have taken action today, corporate 
America should as well. And Fred Smith and Federal Express set the 
lead.

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