After spiking to 6,069 job cuts in September, layoffs in the pharmaceutical industry dropped to 1,900 in October, according to a report in FiercePharma from consultancy Challenger, Gray and Christmas. The industry ranks 7th in total job cuts this month; for most of the year, it's been one of the top five job-cutting industries. But with 45,263 cuts reported so far in 2010, pharma remains the second-highest job-cutting sector. Overall, the pace of job cutting is down 62 percent from a year ago, with employers announcing 449,258 job cuts year to date, compared to 1,192,587 over the same period in 2009.

"Job cuts are the lowest they have been in a decade, due in part to a slowly improving economy; if not the fact that many employers have basically cut their workforces to the bare minimum," Challenger, Gray & Christmas CEO John Challenger. "Unfortunately, the lack of spending by consumers and businesses is stunting demand for new workers. The modest gains in business activity are currently being met by increasing hours of existing workers."

Pharma Layoffs by Month, 2010

Source: Challenger, Gray & Christmas