Abstract This paper examines the macroeconomic influence of the numbers of employees who received notice of dismissal or lay off, in the Swedish manufacturing industry during the period 1980–1994. Given the assumption of fixed labour requirements after the installation of new capital equipments, the statistics over the employees who received notice of dismissal or lay off can be assumed to be closely related to disinvestment. The obtained empirical results suggest that most of the estimated variables are highly significant, both in size and magnitude. The estimations also indicate a significant difference in response to the development of some of the explanatory variables. These findings are reflected in the structural adjustment process of the Swedish manufacturing sector and the general domestic policy by the government.