Boeing just laid off 1,000 workers in Southern California.

Business Insider: “The move comes just a day after Boeing agreed to a $19 billion deal with China to produce 200 airplanes for the country.

It is unclear whether these particular layoffs are connected to the Chinese deal, but there is no question they have caught the eye of working Californians. ‘Corporation inks deal then ships jobs overseas’ is an all-too-familiar tagline in this town.

Boeing’s Long Beach facility, which will bear the burden of 900 of the 1,000 layoffs, had 20,000 employees in 1990. Now they have 7,000.

Project manager, Bob Ciesla, says the layoffs allow the program some job security down the line: “Reducing the number of C-17s we delivery every year – and doing that with a smaller workforce – will allow us to keep the production line open beyond 2012, protect jobs and give potential customers more time to finalize their airlift requirements.”