I can only speak for the UK, but the tech market is very different here. We don't really have large tech companies like in the US. Most tech work in the UK is in sectors like finance, retail, or public sector. While our economy isn't great and there are lay offs it would be wrong to call it "tech layoffs".

We have some tech startups here too though, and those are obviously struggling right now, but startups don't normally lay people off, they simply fail, and that happens all the time anyway.

However, where it is like the US is in the way tech hiring has dropped off a cliff. So if you're working at a startup and the startup fails, or if you're a contractor and your contract isn't renewed then you're going to find it extremely hard to find work right now. I'm getting a lot of messages from ex-colleagues at the moment struggling to find work but thinking about it I don't know anyone who actually got laid off unless you're talking about long-term contracts not being renewed.

The only sector that seems completely fine is public sector work, but there's just not enough public sector work to go around.