[coffeeblack]

Would be great if everybody could be a little less hysterical.

Maybe the team was just sh*t and expensive. They get rid of them, so they can hire better people at a better price. Which make a lot of sense now that many tech companies have big layoffs.

[Nullabillity]

That's not how civilized societies work. You don't just get to fire whoever you want whenever you want.

[umanwizard]

Twitter is headquartered in California, where you do in fact (mostly) get to do that. Whether you consider California to be a "civilized society" is subjective, I suppose.

[whoIsYou]

If people are being overpaid and underperforming why wouldn't the business owner be within their right to fire them?

[thexumaker]

yep. Literally with so many people reneging, working multiple jobs, doing what's required of them, a company has no loyalty to their engineers. The opposite is also true, an engineer shouldn't have too much loyalty to their company. Considering these dudes were making over 200k a year I'm sure they'll be fine and land their next job.

[trashdigitalnom]

You spelled communism wrong.

[over_bridge]

Pass single payer healthcare so that being fired isn't a potentially life or death scenario and there may be some merit to your comment.

If people are safe whether employed or not then by all means fire at will. It's rude but not morally bankrupt in that case.

[trashdigitalnom]

Life happens. And no being fired is not life and death scenario. If you want healthcare you need to find other work. If you can’t find other work then move to other places. If you can’t move to other places then you need to question what made you got into this hole of dependence to your employer from the first place.

If you are skillfull and bring value to your employer why would the fire you and why would other employer won’t want you?

Layoffs are great. They weed out the unproductive ones.

[infamia]

> Layoffs are great. They weed out the unproductive ones.

The vast majority of most layoffs I've seen are either hastily thrown together hail marys or just done looking at how much money they need to cut and then look more or less 100% at compensation or something even more stupid. For companies of any considerable size, rare is the strategic layoff. What Elon did at Twitter is a perfect example of slashing for a number. Elon has not been around long enough to understand what's up or down at Twitter. He has a number in mind he wants to get down to and he just slashes until he gets there. Assuming there are substantial cuts that need to be made, Elon has no clue where he is slashing fat vs. bone, he hasn't been there long enough to know.

[slenk]

Obviously you've never lived paycheck to paycheck. If you don't have a job you can't afford to move - hell, if you have a minimum wage job you can't just afford to move.

Most places at least require a hefty sum of rent up front to even get in somewhere else.

Then if you don't have a job, at least in the US, they recommend you get COBRA, so you don't have any gaps in your health insurance record. Because they decided that was bad. And COBRA is _expensive_. Again, not something you can afford if you are living paycheck to paycheck.

[thiht]

What on Earth does it have to do with communism?

[my12pence]

This is b8

[bitxbitxbitcoin]

Is this part of that social contract I never get to read?

I think every headline about layoffs and restructurings and companies shutting down are proof that some people do in fact get to fire whoever they want whenever they want.

[Nullabillity]

> civilized societies

[bitxbitxbitcoin]

Very Hobbesian.

Civilized companies either don’t exist or don’t follow that social contract because it has been replaced with a different contract: an at will employment agreement.

[arrrg]

How would Musk know (within a week) whether the team is shit and expensive?