The shift is coming about partly because companies in the last year have either folded specialty divisions like Warner Independent Films, which in 2006 had a best picture nominee in "Good Night, and Good Luck," or downsized them, as Paramount did with Paramount Vantage, which in 2007 had a nominee in "Babel".
Applying Bain's patented techniques, they sometimes expanded the companies they bought and at other times they downsized them, but they almost always made a profit.
Among them are downsized machines from Honda, Kawasaki, Ducati and BMW.
With too little food to sustain them, they were downsized by natural selection — a process known as insular dwarfism — and their metabolism was repurposed for stockpiling calories.
With too little food to sustain them, they were downsized by natural selection a process known as insular dwarfism and their metabolism was repurposed for stockpiling calories.
"We thought it was silly to have two big houses, one in Dymchurch and one in France, so we sold them both and downsized," says Pauline. "In England, we moved house mainly because we were getting older and we wanted to be nearer the shops.
Universal executives say they intend to preserve the individual identities of the downsized labels as they fold them into larger groups, but the handful of A & M and Geffen employees who survived the blood bath were skeptical.
They have shut sections of floors to save money on utilities, squeezed remaining employees closer together, torn down walls and downsized cubicles or gotten rid of them entirely.
Rather, they are underemployed middle-aged and older people who have been downsized or otherwise lost jobs, many of them professional, who now scramble to describe themselves as self-employed or consultants.
The logic, union officials argue, is more than a bit stretched, as employers seem likely to pocket the money saved on downsized health care plans rather then turn them into wage bumps.
"It's fair to ask whether contemporary working moms, whose companies have been radically downsized and whose bosses may well expect them to be fused to their BlackBerries 24/7, are quite as serene as their Clinton-era counterparts," she wrote.
