In 1988, Phil Bakes, the president of Eastern Air Lines, announced plans to lay off 4,000 employees and eliminate and reduce service to airports in the Western United States; he said that the airline was going "back to our roots" in the East. At the time, Eastern was the largest corporate employer in the Miami area and remained so after the cuts. John Nordheimer wrote in "The New York Times" that Eastern's prominence in the Miami area decreased as the city became a finance and trade center and experienced population increase-based economic growth, instead of a purely tourism-based growth.