I’m curious if they could claim that the employees have performance issues and simply fire us. It surely hurts the reputation but it’s doable in the US, right? Are there legal reasons to do layoffs instead?
Employment in the US is “at will”. You can be let go at any time, and you are free to resign at any time. There are a variety of reasons why a company might have layoffs. That being said, performance 100% plays a role. Don’t really understand your question, but these are my thoughts.
My question is, why don’t they just let people go without severance? Is it purely for looking good?
Part of it is federal law (you have to pay out PTO), goodwill, PR, not to piss people off further to avoid labor suits. Usually taking severance, companies will also make employees sign certain agreements to absolve themselves of litigation. On top of that, if it's large enough of a layoff triggering WARN, employers have to provide 60 day notice which is why most companies you read about in the news gives at least 2 months severance.
Maybe to avoid lawsuits from 'fired' employees ? 'layoff' with a cushiony severance shuts up the cry a lot
Lol yeah, protecting their reputation in the stock market!
WARN act has specific triggers. If you get rid of people at a fast enough rate, you can no longer claim it’s purely performance based.