[scottostler]

The reason companies don't loudly proclaim this kind of thing seems pretty simple to me. Companies must simultaneously communicate with many different parties: employees, customers, investors, the board, governments, etc. An effective message for one constituency is often horribly inappropriate for another – layoffs are a great example of this.

So when companies do decide that cutting costs is more important than keeping employees, they message that in one way to employees, and in another way to analysts and investors. Employees and the general public who sympathizes with them might call that duplicitous and slimy, but it's a response to the balancing act the companies have to perform.