RENTON, Wash. — Boeing announced Monday it will reduce its commercial airplane workforce by about 5% as the company struggles to increase aircraft production as quickly as planned.
The company has not yet said which locations, divisions, or specific positions will be affected.
Boeing Commercial Airplanes employed roughly 50,500 people at the end of 2025, meaning a 5% reduction would equate to approximately 2,500 positions if applied across that workforce.
The cuts will come through a combination of attrition and involuntary layoffs.
The announcement was made to Boeing Commercial Airplanes employees Monday in a message from division president and CEO Stephanie Pope.
“We need to reset the pace of our production rate ramps to provide our factories and supply chain partners additional time to achieve stability,” Pope wrote. “Adjusting our production schedules and reducing aircraft output puts us in an overstaffed position.”
The announcement comes as Boeing continues working to stabilize and eventually increase production of its 737 MAX aircraft line.
Last month, Boeing CEO Kelly Ortberg acknowledged the company was taking longer than expected to demonstrate stable production at its targeted rate.
“We’re making progress, but we still have more work to do, and I’m expecting it will take us into next year to get fully stable at this rate,” Ortberg said during Boeing’s October earnings call.
Boeing has specifically pointed to wing production as one area that still needs to demonstrate sustained performance before the company can move ahead with further production increases.
The company now expects to reach a production rate of 52, 737 aircrafts per month in the second half of 2027.
Scott Hamilton, managing director of the Leeham Company, told KIRO 7 that problems in wing production in Renton have become a bottleneck as Boeing attempts to increase output.
“Boeing has pointed the finger at the wing production in Renton as going a lot slower than it had wanted,” Hamilton said. “Now, they haven’t been specific as to why that’s going slower. Is that supply chain stuff coming into the factory? Is it production? They just haven’t said.”
Hamilton said he believes the latest workforce reductions could further delay Boeing’s recovery.
“It risks the timing of the recovery,” Hamilton said. “I think this is going to push the recovery out at least a year.”
One major unknown is how much of the 5% reduction will be achieved through attrition and how many employees will ultimately be laid off.
“How many of that is going to be through attrition? I don’t think it’s going to be that many,” Hamilton said. “I think it could be heavily weighted toward the involuntary layoffs.”
Boeing has not provided that breakdown.
The reductions come two years after Boeing announced plans to cut about 10% of its global workforce in 2024. That announcement came during a turbulent year for the aerospace giant that included a machinists strike and the January 2024 door-plug blowout aboard an Alaska Airlines 737 MAX 9.
Despite the new workforce reductions, Boeing executives have said demand for commercial aircraft remains strong. The company has emphasized that it does not want to increase production faster than its factories and suppliers can maintain safety, quality, and stability.
For Boeing workers in Washington, key questions remain unanswered, including how many jobs will be eliminated in the Puget Sound region, which facilities and job classifications will be affected, and how much of the overall reduction will come through layoffs rather than attrition.
Boeing says layoff notifications will begin in December.
Union representatives for Boeing’s SPEEA IFPTE Local 2001 union told KIRO 7 it has a meeting scheduled with Boeing leadership on November 19 to discuss how the announcement will affect its members. Details will be shared with members as they become available.
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