We may have a bit of smoke and mirrors going on, at least in tech layoffs.  Here's my admitedly biased take, before I get into this report:  Infoworld has not always been friendly in their editorials to tech workers, in any article on H-1b they support massive immigration and outsourcing.  So this article might just be painting a rosy picture where there is none.

Having said that, the article points out that actual jobs lost are far less than announced numbers of positions cut.  They give a very good reasons for this- that the first thing you cut is vacant positions by ending the hiring process.  They claim, for instance, that Microsoft's planned 5000 position layoff, only 1400 employees were actually laid off so far.  Sun announced 6000 positions to be laid off- but has only laid off 1300 actual people.