I have seen this idea a lot recently and it sounds very plausible. I wonder though if we have a sense of why it happens? For example, perhaps this only happens

I have seen this idea a lot recently and it sounds very plausible. I wonder though if we have a sense of why it happens? For example, perhaps this only happens when companies are in a downward spiral unable to recover, and they are less and less able to spend the cash to preserve reputation? There could be “survivorship” bias in the sense that the only companies with many rounds of layoffs are in a downward spiral. Which is just to say that, when thinking about whether you should want to be part of a first or second round layoff, you may need to predict the future about whether the company is actually about to enter a downward spiral, before the company leadership predicts it. And, if you are able to do that reliably, you are probably already independently wealthy from making market bets along those lines (and not in a position to be laid off from a job in the first place).