Ask HN: 1M layoffs soon, should gov intervene?
The cumulative number of layoffs in past two months alone is going to hit 1 million employees. Shouldn't the government intervene to prevent social crisis?
54 comments
The unemployment rate is at record lows. Layoffs are part of the natural economic cycle.
That ignores the problem that many H-1B holders will be forced to leave the country. It's in poor taste that these companies are doing this, as it could be the reason that a lot of solid talent leaves the U.S. The U.S. already lost a lot of talent during the pandemic.
that's not really problem for US gov elected by US citizens and I say it as foreigner
obviously if you come to work to foreign country and your visa is tied to job it's only natural it will be void after they fire you and it doesn't mean you can stay as long as you want, I was also kicked out from foreign country after my former employer went extra length to make my life difficult when moving to new company, had to leave country, to get new visa, so I could start new job
obviously if you come to work to foreign country and your visa is tied to job it's only natural it will be void after they fire you and it doesn't mean you can stay as long as you want, I was also kicked out from foreign country after my former employer went extra length to make my life difficult when moving to new company, had to leave country, to get new visa, so I could start new job
That sucks for everyone involved, but as long as GDP grows, wages grow, unemployment goes down, it seems hard for the government to justify intervention to protect "those pesky foreigners".
Yeah this might come back to bite them in the arse in the future but from a political point of view it seems unfeasible to do otherwise.
Yeah this might come back to bite them in the arse in the future but from a political point of view it seems unfeasible to do otherwise.
Totally agree, it's hard, but firing (or retaining) folks based on visa status is inherently unfair too. TBH, there should be some more reasonable period attached to most H-1B visas where holders are given six months to find a new job.
They have 60 days. But in reality that's not enough.
And even then, applying while under H-1B puts you in a difficult position. You don't have that much choice, as your denial might result being out of status. Not to mention that companies might take advantage from it.
And even then, applying while under H-1B puts you in a difficult position. You don't have that much choice, as your denial might result being out of status. Not to mention that companies might take advantage from it.
This might sound like a weird, blunt question, but what's the practical real world implication for an H-1B holder with a good financial situation (12-18 months of survival runway) but a family (spouse, kids in school), and who loses their visa due to losing their job? What actually happens at 60 days? Is there a possibility of just keeping quiet and hoping to find a job before their situation is exposed, or is this super risky in terms of being deported if found out? Could they head back to their home country and start a job search while leaving the family in the house/school in the US? Or are they literally risking their spouse and kids ending up in an immigration detention center somewhere? What is the likelihood of it all being OK if they end up finding a job but had a gap in their immigration status? What is the likelihood that a minor blip upends everything for an otherwise highly employable person?
So family (spouse, children) who are dependent on the other spouse's H-1B have the same problem. Once the status runs out the dependent status runs out too.
After 60 days they need to leave. They MAY get caught, but the USA doesn't actively enforce overstayers on status.
You'll run into problems when you want to re-enter the USA.
And if you wish to stay, you cannot find a (legal) job because your employer needs to fill in an I-9, which will reveal the fact that you are out of status.
After 60 days they need to leave. They MAY get caught, but the USA doesn't actively enforce overstayers on status.
You'll run into problems when you want to re-enter the USA.
And if you wish to stay, you cannot find a (legal) job because your employer needs to fill in an I-9, which will reveal the fact that you are out of status.
So is it safe to leave the country but leave your spouse and kids behind, find a job, and then re-enter, or will this trigger detection of your spouse and kids overstaying?
As long as it is within the 60 day period I don't think so, but IANAL.
When you change jobs under an H-1B, you have to apply for a transfer. It would be found out if you violated the visa terms.
Seems like a feature, not a bug, in the current US immigration policy.
India needs this talent to come back. The H-1B holders will have no trouble finding a job back home, they are the best their country has to offer.
Why didn't India do enough to entice these people to stay in the first place? People own their countries, not the other way around
[deleted]
There is low unemployment because huge numbers of people have left the workforce due to health issues (long covid etc). This is not cyclical.
People have not left the labor force in the last few months. The labor force participation rate is still on a steady upward march since the initial lockdowns.
Sources: Bureau of Labor Statistics https://www.bls.gov/charts/employment-situation/civilian-lab...
Sources: Bureau of Labor Statistics https://www.bls.gov/charts/employment-situation/civilian-lab...
Where are you getting 1 million numbers from? There have been maybe 100k total layoffs from top companies being publicized. Even that is a fraction of the total numbers of engineers in the industry, if we spread out the definition alot and go LALALA with our fingers in our ears.
Not dismissing 100k. That's a significant number and I hope everyone will be ok in the end.
Not dismissing 100k. That's a significant number and I hope everyone will be ok in the end.
based on https://layoffs.fyi/ seems like 1M is rly a bit too much
According to the data from that website:
For some reason, total sum of laid off employees is displayed as 358224, and even though that does not really match the reported 2022+2023 numbers, I could easily imagine that the actual figure crosses the 0.5M given that 30-40% of the listings are not included in math.
- 2022 year - 1044 companies laid off 159786 employees
- 2023 year - 334 companies laid off 101617 employees
For some reason, total sum of laid off employees is displayed as 358224, and even though that does not really match the reported 2022+2023 numbers, I could easily imagine that the actual figure crosses the 0.5M given that 30-40% of the listings are not included in math.
Additionally, a number of companies have chosen to not communicate about their layoffs.
The overall economy has record low unemployment. Tech layoffs are nowhere near 1M. Any direct intervention is likely to produce bad side effects that could be actually worse for everyone. Also, layoffs can be good for the overall economy than avoiding it, after the labor allocation is suboptimal.
https://eig.org/dynamism/
https://www.bls.gov/spotlight/2022/the-decline-in-employment...
I fully expect these layoffs will provide necessary labor for the next generation of startups and smaller firms that will drive the future growth, just like dotcom crash did and the financial crisis did.
https://eig.org/dynamism/
https://www.bls.gov/spotlight/2022/the-decline-in-employment...
I fully expect these layoffs will provide necessary labor for the next generation of startups and smaller firms that will drive the future growth, just like dotcom crash did and the financial crisis did.
I’m not US based.
I don’t know about the social crisis, but if I were the US antitrust I’d take a look at whether a tech sector cartel exists to depress wages.
I don’t know about the social crisis, but if I were the US antitrust I’d take a look at whether a tech sector cartel exists to depress wages.
Right, it seems in late 2022 anyway, there were actually more hires than layoffs.
None of the companies announcing layoffs appear to be struggling financially, in fact the opposite in many case.
So this does have the look of a co-ordinated attempt to reign in wages, albeit very indirectly, and most likely coming from the Fed who have pretty much directly stated this is policy.
Obviously the high wages in tech are an upward drag on all other wages, so it's logical to focus on this area.
None of the companies announcing layoffs appear to be struggling financially, in fact the opposite in many case.
So this does have the look of a co-ordinated attempt to reign in wages, albeit very indirectly, and most likely coming from the Fed who have pretty much directly stated this is policy.
Obviously the high wages in tech are an upward drag on all other wages, so it's logical to focus on this area.
> Obviously the high wages in tech are an upward drag on all other wages, so it's logical to focus on this area.
If you're looking at it through Keynes's perspective there's not a lot of investment that the highly-paid tech workers actually carry out with their total comps, many of them just save most of it in view of early retirement. According to Keynes that's bad, it's just money left not doing anything in view of the famous accumulation.
Supposedly, the money spent on those very high comps would be better spent by the companies themselves carrying out their own investments, and if not successful in doing that then those companies should return the money to the shareholders so that the latter would carry out their own investments. In either case, there would be higher chances of accumulation.
If you're looking at it through Keynes's perspective there's not a lot of investment that the highly-paid tech workers actually carry out with their total comps, many of them just save most of it in view of early retirement. According to Keynes that's bad, it's just money left not doing anything in view of the famous accumulation.
Supposedly, the money spent on those very high comps would be better spent by the companies themselves carrying out their own investments, and if not successful in doing that then those companies should return the money to the shareholders so that the latter would carry out their own investments. In either case, there would be higher chances of accumulation.
Higher salary usually means higher spending, ie paying other people to work.
It seems to me that is much better than 'investing' aka buying ownership of people's work.
I mean, unless there's continual 'investment', someone has to actually pay for the work people do at some point, not just keep buying/paying for ownership of the work/profits they make.
It seems to me that is much better than 'investing' aka buying ownership of people's work.
I mean, unless there's continual 'investment', someone has to actually pay for the work people do at some point, not just keep buying/paying for ownership of the work/profits they make.
Unless most tech workers are 50+, they would not be saving the majority of that money, but rather investing it in the stock market.
Investment rates and savings rates go hand in hand, and taking money from the upper middle class to give to the investor class is not sound economic policy. Savings don't depress investments, on the contrary they reduce capital costs and allow for more investment without inflation. Banks don't actually keep your money on hand, they lend almost all of it out.
I don't know Keynes well enough to know if your take on his work is valid, but I do know that parts of his theories were found lacking 50 years ago in the last bout of stagflation.
Investment rates and savings rates go hand in hand, and taking money from the upper middle class to give to the investor class is not sound economic policy. Savings don't depress investments, on the contrary they reduce capital costs and allow for more investment without inflation. Banks don't actually keep your money on hand, they lend almost all of it out.
I don't know Keynes well enough to know if your take on his work is valid, but I do know that parts of his theories were found lacking 50 years ago in the last bout of stagflation.
> Investment rates and savings rates go hand in hand, and taking money from the upper middle class to give to the investor class is not sound economic policy.
The upper middle class at most is investing their money in index funds, gone are the days of angel investors who had made their money from Google comps. For the sake of argument, they're putting their money in the 2% investment funds.
The "investor class", supposedly, is putting their money in higher-risk but also in higher-reward vehicles/entities, let's say entities that get them a 5% ROI. That 5% > 2% has been the essence of capitalism development ever since the industrial revolution got going, i.e. we haven't gotten to this point by playing it safe and putting our past money in the 2% financial vehicles.
The upper middle class at most is investing their money in index funds, gone are the days of angel investors who had made their money from Google comps. For the sake of argument, they're putting their money in the 2% investment funds.
The "investor class", supposedly, is putting their money in higher-risk but also in higher-reward vehicles/entities, let's say entities that get them a 5% ROI. That 5% > 2% has been the essence of capitalism development ever since the industrial revolution got going, i.e. we haven't gotten to this point by playing it safe and putting our past money in the 2% financial vehicles.
Presumably they save it by placing it into the market in lots of cases, no?
OP is misguided. The social crisis is the inflation that followed far too much quantitative easing and then government spending. It's unfortunate the fed's tools are so blunt, but their approach to tackling the inflation inevitably comes in the form of layoffs. These layoffs are collateral in the fight against inflation. It will pass.
Not going to be popular to say, but Dont think they should be using "quantitative easing" at all.
All it did is kick a can down the road and allow a bunch of dishonest players to scoop the cream off the top.
All it did is kick a can down the road and allow a bunch of dishonest players to scoop the cream off the top.
I think that is the common belief now. QE failed and we are now reaping what we sowed.
you mean another one? (they already busted one)
The whole point of increasing interest rates is to force high unemployment and stop workers from negotiating better wages. Why would government suddenly intervene in its own policy?
I'd be very interested in a breakdown of the skills that are being laid off from 'tech', not only in terms of 'marketing', 'recruitment', 'management', 'engineering', 'massage', etc, but also for engineers, what skills eg 'junior', 'senior' 'frontend', 'backend', 'java', 'C++', etc.
The gov is driving the layoffs with interest hikes. They WANT the layoffs.
Sensationalist headline.
proof please.
According to layoffs.fyi, 2022+ytd 2023 is <260k. That’s 20k a month tops, 2 orders of magnitude off.
According to bls, here are the unemployment numbers by month. https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t10.htm
proof please.
According to layoffs.fyi, 2022+ytd 2023 is <260k. That’s 20k a month tops, 2 orders of magnitude off.
According to bls, here are the unemployment numbers by month. https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t10.htm
1 - "cumulative number of layoffs in past two months alone is going to hit 1 million employees" The state itself created this situation with the inflation since the end of Bretton Woods (specially the inflation during 2020-2021). If you give booze to an alcoholic he will get drunk and afterwards he will have a hangover.
2 - "Shouldn't the government intervene to prevent social crisis?" - Despite warning from people like Hayke and Mises, people tried to do all sorts of state-controlled economies (Germany, USSR, modern USA, etc). It didn't work. Better to drink lots of water, take a rest, and not get drunk next time.
2 - "Shouldn't the government intervene to prevent social crisis?" - Despite warning from people like Hayke and Mises, people tried to do all sorts of state-controlled economies (Germany, USSR, modern USA, etc). It didn't work. Better to drink lots of water, take a rest, and not get drunk next time.
These figures look pretty good to me:
https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t01.htm
https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t01.htm
Should the government have intervened when they were hiring too many people? Should the government intervene to have them more effectively use their personnel?
> Should the government have intervened when they were hiring too many people?
It DID intervene. That's why we have the layoffs now.
It DID intervene. That's why we have the layoffs now.
No.
The US economy added 500k jobs last quarter, so there isn’t really a social crisis
In the US, we have the unemployment insurance system that’s run by the government already. Isn’t this a government intervention that’s already there? What else should they be doing?
Doubt it is necessary.
But maybe the govt can hire these people to improve a bunch of the aging software we have.
Pay them a decent salary + pension.
But maybe the govt can hire these people to improve a bunch of the aging software we have.
Pay them a decent salary + pension.
Government: if you think the problems we create are bad, wait until you see our solutions.
Depends on the hiring figures. Maybe they are mostly finding jobs elsewhere.