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Comment by michaelt | Hacker News Reader

You're absolutely right; shame on whoever made the decisions! In this case, it was certainly within their power to make a better choice, and they should have done.

However, if you want tech jobs to have a higher and guaranteed severance, national legislation might be more effective.

After all, many acquisitions and layoffs are at companies that are in dire financial straits, which limits discretionary spending.

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I'm certainly a fan of legislation to require severance. That said I'm also all about shaming bad actors so that other workers are aware of what they can expect when engaging them.

There is no reason to involve businesses in the equation. If your goal is to ensure people have cash in the event they are terminated from their job, then have the government give them cash in the event they are terminated from their job.

Why should the taxpayers bear this cost instead of the business who is choosing to terminate the person, especially in situations like those discussed where it has nothing to do with the performance of the individual?

The government can collect taxes from the businesses, and call it something like unemployment insurance premiums in the US.

There is no reason to over complicate things and require businesses to directly pay, figure out how much cash to always have to be able to pay, hire auditors to make sure they have enough cash, then take them to court when they don’t have enough cash to pay, yadda yadda.

Business sells product or service. Employee sells labor to business. Government takes care of the safety nets.

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