In general, what is the layoff policy and practice in US? How much the company has to pay, how much IT sector usually pays? Also, what are the usual time limits in the industry?
In most of the country (California is probably an exception), the company does not have to pay anything at all.
I don't know about "usually". A lot of these big SV companies seem to usually pay some severance.
> Also, what are the usual time limits in the industry?
What time limits do you mean? As in, what notice do they have to give you? In much if not most of the country, none.
That's not exactly true, the company does have to pay unemployment insurance and each state has varying laws. Most states tax sites will have the documents.
Was just wondering as this might screw up with someone if they are short on money, have mortgage, etc.
In EU, there is some minimum notice time (I think two weeks?). In practice (from what I've seen) it's usually two to three months, but layoffs would be done immediately by agreement (basically pay for that period anyway). Minimum severance is one-month-pay (average, so bonuses included) for each year worked, limited to three.
So in real life, one would get 5-6 months pay when being laid off. Depending on the situation (reason for the lay off), one might not be able to spend their vacation and that would have to be paid off as well. On top of that you might apply for unemployment benefit (which you paid for, so I'm not sure how relevant it is).
I could walk into work this morning, get laid off, and escorted out of the building without notice. That's it, done, no more salary. To make it even worse, you also lose the subsidized health insurance. My employer pays about 60% of the cost for my family, so my monthly premiums would jump from $800 to nearly $2000 a month at the same time my income drops to near zero.
Sure there's unemployment payments, but they're usually only a fraction of your previous salary, and are often capped to a maximum by your individual state.
Welcome to capitalism ;)
You have to give at least two weeks warning to the employer if you want to leave, but if they want to fire you, they just show you the door without warning. Note that the employer may then just fire you anyways, so your courteous notice results in two weeks without pay. For some reason, this is considered fine, even in industries where it's a laborer's market.
Still even provisions like that are inconsistently applied. I worked at an internal development studio of a large video game publisher that closed, resulting in the layoff of all ~90 employees. The studio had two offices: one in Los Angeles, California and another, smaller office in Austin, Texas. The employees at the LA office were covered under the WARN act and thus paid/insured through the end of the year (2 months) and received company severance on top of that. Those of us at the smaller Austin office were not covered under the WARN act as we had less than 50 employees at that location. Instead we received a check for our last two week pay period and the aforementioned severance package.
Anyway I'm not sure this scenario is any better than the US scenario of little to no employee protection. Sure, it means you're not flat and your back from day one, but the cost firing anyone is substantial, making it very difficult particularly for small business to hire simply because the risk is too great. I'd be keen to learn if there are other ways to reduce that risk than simply making it easier to fire people indiscriminately.
If the company isn't in dire financial straits, it's common to give some severance pay, usually tied to length of employment. This isn't a requirement.
With the US's ridiculous system of getting most health insurance through your employer, it does mean that you lose many of those health benefits. There is a legal provision called COBRA where you can continue for a time on your previous employer's health care (at your expense). The ACA (Obamacare) makes losing your health insurance less dire than it was in the past (for things like "pre-existing conditions"), but it still sucks.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Worker_Adjustment_and_Retraini...
>An employer who violates the WARN provisions is liable to each employee for an amount equal to back pay and benefits for the period of the violation, up to 60 days.
...pretty much says companies can do what they want. For a lot of these folks, that's a severance.