SBM Site Services performs the custodial work at Microsoft as a subcontractor for Grubb & Ellis, which manages the buildings on the company's headquarters campus. A Grubb & Ellis representative could not be reached for comment.

Berg said the decision to downsize was "purely internal."

"There was no pressure placed on SBM by any external organizations," she said. "It's just downsizing, same as everybody else is trying to manage their expenses and productivity rates in this economy. Workforce reductions are just necessary during this time."

Prockiw said he doesn't think this is like other layoffs going on throughout the economy. "This is purely a greed cut," he said.

Relations between the union and SBM appear rocky. Berg said the company tried to work with the union leadership on the job cuts after notifying them last month.

"And unfortunately they decided not to participate when it came time to actually do the reductions, so we were forced to move forward without their involvement," she said.

Prockiw said the union did meet with SBM to review the workloads and make changes without cutting jobs. "They back-stabbed us," he said. "They implemented all the layoffs and did everything against everything we discussed."

Estimates of the size of the crowd demonstrating at the corner of 156th Avenue Northeast and Northeast 36th Street differed so dramatically that I'm not going to report a figure here because I didn't see it myself. But they appear to be significantly better organized -- with leaflets and a bullhorn -- than an earlier protest by contract workers facing a 10 percent pay cut.