December 16 Is the Newest Week on the WARN Calendar: 5,491 Workers Scheduled

The layoff calendar kept growing this week. The newest week on the WARN calendar — the week of December 16 — now shows 5,491 workers with scheduled effective dates. It is the second-heaviest week in the six-week window, behind only the Thanksgiving week, and it arrives right after the two quietest weeks of the period.

As of the latest update on November 11, the Layoff Atlas registry holds 665 WARN notices covering 64,336 reported workers in the 90-day window, with 30 notices carrying no worker count. That works out to about 97 workers per notice on average — a reminder that most WARN filings are mid-size events, not headline-scale closures.

The six weeks ahead

Here is the full six-week picture, by effective date:

Week of November 11: 6,146 workers
Week of November 18: 5,939 workers
Week of November 25: 9,858 workers
Week of December 2: 1,990 workers
Week of December 9: 1,746 workers
Week of December 16: 5,491 workers

The six weeks total 31,170 scheduled workers. The week of November 25 alone accounts for 31.6% of that total. The December 16 week accounts for 17.6% — the second-largest share, and more than triple the lightest week.

The Thanksgiving peak comes first

Before the calendar reaches December, the heaviest week on it is the one that includes Thanksgiving Day, Thursday, November 26. At 9,858 workers, the week of November 25 is 5.6 times the size of the lightest week (December 9, at 1,746) and nearly double the December 16 week.

That peak has been the heaviest week on the calendar for about two weeks now, and it has not moved. The filings behind it were set in motion in September and October, when employers gave their 60 days' notice. In other words, the Thanksgiving-week layoffs were decided well before the holiday season began — the effective dates just happen to land on the holiday.

The December dip — and the rebound

What makes the new December 16 figure interesting is the shape around it. The two weeks after Thanksgiving are the quietest of the six: December 2 (1,990 workers) and December 9 (1,746 workers) add up to just 3,736 workers combined — barely more than a third of the Thanksgiving week's total.

Then the calendar jumps back up. The December 16 week, at 5,491 workers, is 3.1 times the December 9 week. So December is not a steady wind-down. It is a lull followed by a second wave, with the new week's total closer to the November weeks than to the early-December ones.

That pattern is worth watching rather than assuming. Effective dates are set by employers' notice schedules, not by the calendar, so a quiet week does not mean layoffs have stopped — it means fewer notices happen to take effect that week. The December 16 rebound is the latest evidence of that.

Two states carry the totals

The national picture is still dominated by two states. California accounts for 20,862 reported workers in the 90-day window, and Washington for 17,387. Together that is 38,249 workers — 59.5% of the national total of 64,336. Illinois (3,432), Maryland (2,667), and Virginia (2,556) round out the top five, but none of them comes close to the top two.

California's share has grown noticeably. Four weeks ago, the same rolling 90-day window showed California at 15,042 workers and Washington at 16,855, with a national total of 66,487. California has added more than 5,800 workers to its window total since then, while the national total actually edged down. The state's recent filings — including large December and January effective dates — are doing most of that work.

The calendar already reaches into 2027

The December 16 week is the newest on the calendar, but it is not the end of the story. Filings with effective dates in early 2027 are already on the books. Among the most recent: Children's Place Distribution's 593-worker filing in Fort Payne, Alabama, effective January 5, 2027, filed with exactly 60 days' notice; A&G Management's 120-worker filing in Anne Arundel County, Maryland, effective January 3, 2027; The Container Store's 183-worker Maryland closure, effective January 15, 2027; and AT&T's 50-worker New Jersey filing, effective January 31, 2027.

Those January dates are a useful check on the December numbers. Employers are still filing notices now for layoffs that take effect two and three months out, which means the calendar will keep extending as November turns into December.

How to read these numbers

A few cautions apply to everything above. These are reported plans, not confirmed job losses — a WARN notice records what an employer says it plans to do, and plans can change. Worker totals exclude the 30 notices with unavailable counts, so the true figures are higher than the ones shown. Coverage and reporting rules vary by state, so a state with a low total may have thin reporting rather than few layoffs. And the 90-day window rolls forward every day: as older notices drop out and new ones arrive, the totals shift even when nothing fundamental has changed.

With those cautions in mind, the shape of the next six weeks is clear. A heavy Thanksgiving week, two quiet weeks, and then a December 16 week that brings the numbers back up. Workers, employers, and local officials in the affected states should plan for the peak first — and not mistake the early-December quiet for the end of it.

Data source: Layoff Atlas.