Caterpillar: Stimulus plan may help regain jobs

Caterpillar Inc., the world's biggest maker of bulldozers and excavation equipment, said an economic stimulus package may eventually help the company bring back workers who have lost their jobs.

"If these packages are enacted quickly, they could stimulate demand for our products that would likely, over time, provide Caterpillar the opportunity to recall employees who have been laid off during this downturn," Chief Executive Officer Jim Owens said today in a statement.

Caterpillar in January announced more than 22,000 job cuts and this week unveiled a voluntary early retirement plan that would eliminate another 2,000 workers as it copes with a global recession and credit crisis. Caterpillar has said it may post a first-quarter loss, its first in 16 years, and that its sales may drop 22 percent in 2009 to $40 billion.

"As a bellwether company for the global economy, we are experiencing the unprecedented depth of this still-unfolding global recession," Owens, who hosted President Barack Obama at a Caterpillar factory in Peoria, Illinois yesterday, said in today's statement. "We believe strongly a fiscal infrastructure investment will create construction jobs in the near term, and enhance the competitive position of the U.S. in the global economy."

Congress is set to give final approval today to an economic stimulus package of about $787 billion after lawmakers worked out last-minute disagreements over executive compensation and taxes.

Peoria-based Caterpillar fell 12 cents to $30.90 at 12:59 p.m. in New York Stock Exchange composite trading. The shares have declined 57 percent in the last 12 months.