Eli Lilly told the state of Indiana that job cuts at its Indianapolis headquarters will be permanent. The company (left) said in a letter to the Indiana Department of Workforce Development that the cuts aren’t expected to exceed one-third of headcount at any one site or more than 500 employees at any site this year, the Indianapolis Star reported. In July, the company said it had cut 2,100 jobs worldwide since September and would cut 5,500 by 2011 to realize $1 billion in annual cost savings.

Layoffs by pharma firms—many hitting sales forces hard—were down in July, year-on-year, by 30%, according to outplacement consultancy Challenger, Gray and Christmas. That will be cold comfort to most, considering that, with 2,023 layoffs announced this month and 37,010 for the year to date, the industry is the second most layoff-stricken, according to the consultancy, behind the government/non-profit sector (105,969 cuts for the year-to-date) and ahead of retail (26,993 cuts).

The Department of Labor filed an amicus brief in the case of a former SmithKline Beecham rep seeking overtime pay, asserting that reps cannot be held to be exempt from Federal overtime regulations.