Andrii Bidochko

• Updated: February 23, 2026
• 7 min read

WARN Firehose: Real‑Time US Layoff Data Platform

WARN Firehose: Real‑Time US Layoff Data API Unveiled

WARN Firehose is a unified, daily‑updated API that aggregates every U.S. WARN Act layoff notice into a single, searchable database, offering CSV, JSON, Parquet, and interactive chart exports for journalists, investors, recruiters, and researchers.

What Is WARN Firehose?

Every state in the United States publishes WARN (Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification) Act layoff notices in a myriad of formats—PDFs, Excel sheets, HTML tables, and even handwritten PDFs. WARN Firehose scrapes, normalizes, and unifies these disparate sources into one searchable, machine‑readable repository. Updated automatically each day, the platform now holds more than 109,000 notices affecting over 12.9 million workers and includes historical data dating back to 1998.

Core Features and Data Offerings

Comprehensive 50‑State Coverage

WARN Firehose runs dedicated scrapers for all 50 states, guaranteeing that no layoff notice slips through the cracks. The data pipeline is fully automated, meaning the database is refreshed daily without manual intervention.

Multiple Export Formats

• CSV – Ideal for spreadsheet analysis and quick ad‑hoc queries.
• JSON – Perfect for web developers and API consumers.
• Parquet – Optimized for big‑data workloads in Spark, Hive, or Presto.
• JSON‑LD with schema.org markup – Ready for semantic web and AI consumption.

Interactive Charts & Visualizations

Built‑in dashboards let users explore trends instantly: state heatmaps, company rankings, YoY comparisons, and sector‑level drill‑downs. These visual tools are especially valuable for AI marketing agents that need to surface data‑driven insights on the fly.

AI‑Ready Data Streams

Beyond static files, WARN Firehose offers MCP (Message‑Channel‑Protocol) streams in JSON‑LD, Parquet, and NDJSON, enabling seamless integration with large language models such as Claude or GPT. This makes the dataset “AI‑ready” for applications ranging from automated news alerts to predictive workforce analytics.

Why It Matters: Benefits for Key Audiences

Journalists – Break Stories First

With real‑time alerts and a powerful search interface, reporters can discover major layoffs before they hit the mainstream news cycle. By filtering by company, industry, or geography, journalists can craft compelling narratives backed by verified data.

Investors & Hedge Funds – Spot Economic Signals

Mass layoffs often precede earnings warnings or sector downturns. Investors can monitor portfolio companies and competitors, using the API to feed custom dashboards that flag workforce reductions as early warning indicators.

Recruiters – Find Displaced Talent Early

Recruitment teams can query the database for recent layoffs at target firms, then proactively reach out to affected professionals before rival agencies do. This gives a strategic edge in talent acquisition.

Economists & Researchers – Clean, Structured Data for Modeling

Academic and policy researchers gain access to a longitudinal dataset spanning more than two decades. Bulk exports in Parquet or JSON enable direct ingestion into R, Python, or ML pipelines for labor‑market modeling, trend analysis, and policy impact studies.

Workforce Boards & Government Agencies – Rapid Response Planning

Local workforce development boards can receive early warnings of mass layoffs in their region, allowing them to coordinate retraining programs, unemployment services, and community outreach before workers are displaced.

Real Estate Analysts – Anticipate Market Shifts

Large layoffs affect housing demand, commercial vacancy rates, and local tax revenues. By tracking WARN notices at the county level, analysts can forecast shifts in real‑estate dynamics and advise investors accordingly.

How to Access and Use the WARN Firehose API

1. Obtain an API Key – Sign up on the WARN Firehose portal (free tier available) and receive a unique token.
2. Query the Data – Use the RESTful endpoints with standard HTTP methods. Filters include state, company_name, industry, date_range, and employee_count. Pagination and sorting are built‑in.
3. Download Bulk Exports – For large‑scale analysis, request CSV, JSON, or Parquet files via the /export endpoint. The service supports streaming for files >1 GB.
4. Integrate with Your Workflow – Combine the API with data pipelines, BI tools, or custom dashboards. The JSON‑LD schema aligns with UBOS platform overview for rapid integration.

Below is a minimal Python example that fetches the latest layoffs in California and saves them as a CSV file:

import requests, csv

API_KEY = 'YOUR_API_KEY'
BASE_URL = 'https://api.warnfirehose.com/v1/layoffs'

params = {
    'state': 'CA',
    'page': 1,
    'per_page': 1000
}
headers = {'Authorization': f'Bearer {API_KEY}'}

response = requests.get(BASE_URL, params=params, headers=headers)
data = response.json()['results']

with open('ca_layoffs.csv', 'w', newline='') as f:
    writer = csv.DictWriter(f, fieldnames=data[0].keys())
    writer.writeheader()
    writer.writerows(data)

Leveraging WARN Firehose Inside the UBOS Ecosystem

UBOS provides a low‑code environment that can ingest, transform, and visualize external APIs without writing extensive boilerplate code. Below are several ways you can bring WARN Firehose data into UBOS projects:

• Web App Editor on UBOS – Use the Web app editor on UBOS to create a dashboard that displays real‑time layoff heatmaps. Drag‑and‑drop a REST connector, paste your API key, and map the JSON fields to chart components.
• Workflow Automation Studio – Set up a daily trigger that pulls the latest CSV export, stores it in a Chroma DB integration, and then sends a summary email to your newsroom. The Workflow automation studio handles retries and error logging automatically.
• AI‑Powered Templates – Jump‑start a project with the UBOS templates for quick start. For example, the “AI SEO Analyzer” template can be repurposed to analyze layoff notice headlines for SEO impact, while the “AI Article Copywriter” template can auto‑generate briefing notes for journalists.
• Voice‑Enabled Alerts – Combine the ElevenLabs AI voice integration with the WARN Firehose API to create an audio briefing that reads out the top five layoffs of the day. This can be delivered via a Telegram bot using the Telegram integration on UBOS.
• ChatGPT‑Powered Support – Deploy the OpenAI ChatGPT integration to answer ad‑hoc queries like “How many tech layoffs occurred in Texas last quarter?” The model can pull live data from the API and respond in natural language.

These integrations illustrate how the Enterprise AI platform by UBOS turns raw labor‑market data into actionable intelligence across departments.

Conclusion: Turn Layoff Data into Strategic Advantage

WARN Firehose delivers the most comprehensive, up‑to‑date WARN Act dataset on the market, packaged in formats that serve both human analysts and AI engines. Whether you are a journalist racing to break a story, an investor hunting early signals, a recruiter seeking displaced talent, or a researcher building macro‑economic models, the API provides a reliable foundation.

Ready to start building? Visit the WARN Firehose website to obtain your API key, explore the documentation, and join the community of data‑driven professionals.

For developers already on the UBOS platform, explore the UBOS pricing plans and see how quickly you can spin up a custom layoff‑monitoring solution. Need inspiration? Check out the UBOS portfolio examples for real‑world use cases.

Stay ahead of the labor market—integrate WARN Firehose today.

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Andrii Bidochko

CTO UBOS

Andrii Bidochko is an AI entrepreneur and researcher focused on AI agents, reinforcement learning, and autonomous systems. He writes about the technologies shaping the future of machine intelligence, from frontier models and agent architectures to real-world AI applications.