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At a US F500 company, HR can still make it onerous to get rid of an underperforming employee. Wants multiple documented poor reviews to avoid any potential for follow-up legal action (which seems incredibly unlikely, but HR wants to cover their butts).

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I suspect these processes are also there to prevent “rocking the boat”. There are a number of US F500 companies that are effectively static businesses with predictable market dynamics.

In a stable environment, in a large organization, it doesn’t really make sense to fire people in the hopes of getting someone better. You are more likely to get someone worse, or more expensive, or who has a long ramp up period. It’s possible that the manager trying to exit an employee is exercising subjective/uncalibrated performance guidelines- or is covering their own incompetence.