Job losses going to rise with mega mergers, warns Goldman Sachs chief

The prospect of a spate of white-collar job losses in the United States is a growing concern for the Wall Street's top matchmaker for megadeals. “Politicians are going to be faced with the uncomfortable reality that you’re going to have more big business doing better and that there’s going to be more losses of jobs along the way,” Goldman Sachs Group Inc. President John Waldron said at a conference on Friday, according to Bloomberg.

“You are going to see a fairly sizable amount of large-cap M&A coming with stronger, healthier companies being the acquirer and taking advantage of weaknesses in their industry or elsewhere,” he added.

About 898,000 Americans filed for first-time unemployment benefits last week, an unexpected jump from the previous week and the metric’s highest level since August, Labor Department data showed Thursday.

Waldron warned of “sticky unemployment,” with people already facing workforce automation watching more positions disappear once companies combine.

“Our clients are more desirous of playing offense and doing deals. That’s a good thing,” he told. But that includes large companies “looking to consolidate smaller companies, and that will be complicated societally.”

Goldman Sachs has been one of the biggest beneficiaries of this year’s turmoil, with its core Wall Street trading and dealmaking operations facing a surge in demand from investors and corporations looking to reposition themselves or raise capital.

(With inputs from Bloomberg)