Honestly every single one of those execs is very replaceable too.
A hiring freeze and marking obsolete positions as obsolete (meaning if someone switches teams or quits that specific position will not be replaced) should be a workable model for all profitable companies with some cash reserves. Sure, it takes a bit longer and probably costs a bit more (though probably not tons and lay offs also have other traumatic effects concerning knowledge loss, morale and motivation that can negatively affect the business) but it's a workable model.
Embed that into overall more cautious hiring in good times (yeah, we can't time travel, so that's not an option - but to me that's the thing that should be learned from this) and you should never have to do any layoffs if your business is basically sound. I would be shocked, for example, if Apple were to do any lay offs. They seem to follow that approach (well, probably not in the retail context which I also think is unfortunate).
To me it seems like those lay offs are primarily a tool to communicate and that just sucks. It sucks that something that should clearly be seen as a management failure (if you need to do lay offs it seems to me obvious that management is to blame, not those laid off) can in this weird upside down world be used as a communication tool towards the wider world that they are doing something useful. Even if it wouldn't be needed.
Also, I just don't think people should be treated like that, especially if it's not needed. It seems so pointlessly cruel and inhuman. This is not the world I want to live in.
And I know that's hard to pull off in capitalism. Maybe that's the issue. Though it's not as if you cannot modify capitalism to at least not allow for stuff like this.
That's not the relevant question. The relevant questions are: were the layoffs illegal, and if they weren't, then why is it any of your business? If you don't want to live in that world, start your own startup, hire people, and never fire them. Nobody is stopping you.
Also, in general I don’t live in that world. It‘s much harder for sound companies to just lay off people in Germany (though not impossible).
Free association in labour is not possible when there's so much leverage from one of the sides of the negotiation. In a perfect idealised model, labour will increase in price due to people not accepting jobs they would, ideally, not think it's worth it, companies will then raise salaries, market equilibrium! In reality people are mothers, fathers, or just basically anyone who needs something to eat, and for food they'll accept any trade to keep some part of their dignity.
A fucking spherical cow-ish principle doesn't take into account human dignity into their pricing models... And so these people work backwards by adapting that if it's not accounted for it's irrelevant, rather than the opposite reality that we experience.
I was really fascinated to learn that most North Americans never even encounter the concept of ordocapitalism/ordoliberalism in their basic economics courses. Somehow, a concept of capitalist economic organization that has been the recipe for success for the creation of most successful economic turnaround in modern times is just...ignored?
The beauty of America is you can do my suggestion (make your own startup, run it without firing people), but in other places where layoffs are illegal, you can't do the opposite suggestion (make your own startup, fire people). Let the best idea win! But you seem to be endorsing a world where you don't want the best idea to win, you want the state to enforce a particular idea that makes you feel good.
If you are free to run a company however you want within the bounds of the law, but only one type of company emerges, maybe there is a reason for that.
I think a more relevant question is: should the layoffs be illegal?
Just because todays law says “tough luck” doesn’t mean it has always been, or will always be, that way, or that we can’t argue for something better.
If the layoffs were uneccesary you know to treat the company and its executives as worse to work for than they would be if they did necessary layoffs only.
I.e. increase the cost of hiring you.
The "none of your business" trope is silly. Why not warm each other of shitty things, be it a bad restaurant or MS as an employer.
Originally corporate charters were hard to get because they were only issued by the Crown. Nowadays you can get one for a few dollars. We need to ask ourselves if they are still serving the public purpose we intend, and if not how we need to adjust things.
And why is that?