I think the simple answer is that "investors demand it." Investors may indeed be predicting a recession, and it's probably true that many of these firms overhi

I think the simple answer is that "investors demand it." Investors may indeed be predicting a recession, and it's probably true that many of these firms overhired. But there's no specific fiscal reason for most of these companies to cut staff--5% the cost of their workforce is not standing in the way of billion-dollar deals (e.g. MSFT/Blizzard) or long-term R&D spending (Meta, whatever you want to say about their Metaverse project). Bluntly: cutting staff is the new stock buyback.