Agree on "being unemployed does not look great", but senior, financially secure folks that chose to take a year off will likely have "developing tools to deploy

Agree on "being unemployed does not look great", but senior, financially secure folks that chose to take a year off will likely have "developing tools to deploy X at Y at a stealth startup" or some such on their resume instead. Plus, IME "being umeployed is not great" applies just to chances of getting to the first technical interview. After that, it is just interview-based. Bottom line: I am not shedding any tears for most senior engineering folks who worked through one of the most favorable decades for software engineers. Yes, changing is uncomfortable, but they should have options that are way better than a free soup kitchen. My 2c.