[JamesBarney]

Unions probably have better severance packages but how many times is a typical worker laid off in their life?

There are costs to increasing the cost of a layoff. It means corporations will rely on credentialism more, and take fewer risks. I'd rather live in a world where you can jump into software without a college degree, but maybe have to save a little money at your very well paying job than one that only hires college grads with a 3.5 GPA but you get a generous severance package.

[syntaxing]

I worked for 5 jobs or so in my decade of experience. Every single one had layoffs (usually 10%+). Layoffs aren’t that common in tech until now but were always prevalent in the “industry”.

[JamesBarney]

I think there is a large difference between number of employees who have worked at a company that had has layoffs, and number of times they were laid off.

Assuming your experience is representative of every company (I don't think it is) then every company lays off 10% of their workforce every 2 years.

Assume a random distribution (I don't think this is true) that means the average worker get laid off once every twenty years. So you're looking at 2 lay offs a career. Savings should be sufficient for this. Policies or agreements like this just make good hirs cheaper, and bad hires more expensive.