If I could perhaps offer a middle of the road take. I think there's immaturity on both sides of this. Many employees are treating employment as a kind of child

If I could perhaps offer a middle of the road take. I think there's immaturity on both sides of this. Many employees are treating employment as a kind of child-parent relationship, where as long as they're at least moderately obedient, they're entitled to be taken care of. On the other hand, there's certain employers who feel a childish need to show how strong they are, by being ruthless, and making big dramatic "difficult" changes (not difficult for them) as a kind of theatrical performance of how action-taking they are. If approached maturely, employers would be reticent to do layoffs like this, because they show comically poor staffing management, and cause huge waste and losses. And employees would put more effort into career defence, rather than putting all effort into working hard for an employer, who they can't guarantee will or can reciprocate their loyalty. I.e. greater diligence is needed on both sides.