I don't believe it's smart to have people on the payroll just because. If they're not producing value for a business, then a business should remove them. Yes, it does suck for the person getting fired, but that's life, they'll find a different job.

No, I mean people who earn $100-200k/year and do nothing. Consumer products company had hundreds of these people.

People aren't entitled to their jobs any more than any other business is entitled to their customers. To think that they are is to infantilize salarymen and to perceive them less as free economic agents and more like serfs, incapable of proving their worth in a free, competitive market.