In many ways worse than the immediate loss of job/income, though, is that your medical coverage is usually (and by usually, I means pretty much always) tied to your employment. So if you're pregnant, or if you're on expensive life-saving medicines, well, you have a problem.
There are various band-aids to try and help people out when they lose their job, but none of them are particularly impressive, looking on them from a European perspective.
I'm a Brit, been here for almost 20 years, basically for the money. I would have left and returned back to the UK 5 years or so ago (having made enough to keep us comfortably for the rest of our lives) but the kid is in school, and my (US) wife doesn't want to uproot him (which is fair). Once he's off to college, I'm going to retire, stay a while on relatively low "income" to get out of the "fuck you" tax for green-card holders leaving the country, and I'm (we're) out of here.
That has not been true for ten years now, with the implementation of the Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare). It used to be that pre-existing conditions tied you strongly to continuous employment (except for periods of COBRA coverage avaialble), but those are no longer grounds for denying you new coverage. And if your income has dropped a lot, most if not all of the coverage will be subsidized by the government.
This seems to be very location-dependent. Most states will be reasonably generous and extend Medicaid coverage to you. Some will not. Even when you have Medicaid coverage, it's still a crap-shoot whether a Dr. will take you on as a patient. Hospitals will, in general, but there's plenty of Dr's offices with "No Medicaid" signs in them.
COBRA is an utter joke. If you've just lost your job, how are you supposed to afford $1750/month [1] for medical insurance for your family ?
I think Obamacare was a step in the right direction for health-care in the US. I think it's woefully short of just about anywhere in Europe. The entire healthcare industry in the US seems to pile on huge amounts of stress right at the point where you need to just get well. In-network/Out-of-network, covered/non-covered, co-pays, crazy-high deductibles, the works. In the UK, the only thing I worry about paying for is parking at the hospital...
[1]:https://www.brookings.edu/blog/usc-brookings-schaeffer-on-he...
Everything else you said is spot on.
Not every company will necessarily enforce and fire people at a moments notice. While yes that can happen, I think any reasonable business cares about perception and employee morale.
Aside from that, I think everything you said is spot on.
It is generally coupled with a severance package, which if taken delays your eligibility to avail yourself of your State's unemployment benefits. Many states are at will employment. It is customary to give two weeks notice, but not strictly required.
The U.S. can be a fickle beast.
It really depends on how it's structured and which state.
Is this an expression?
[edit] While it's certainly rude, there is effectively no downside to me doing this.
> perfectly normal to wake up and find out you've been fired
I should add that this is by no means "perfectly normal." In fact, the reason it makes the news is that it isn't. Most people will have at least some inkling that they're about to be fired or laid off.
In the UK[1] the legal minimum is 1 week notice in their first two years of employment, then it's 1 week per year.
It's common in some industries to have a 4 week notice after a 3-6 month probation, but it's not universal.
[1] which obviously had to confirm with EU law, even if it's now left
I had to look this up. This is definitely not a thing in the US. Why would a company even offer that? Also, the US you can basically leave a job whenever you want.
> from what I read here in the US it is perfectly normal to wake up and find out you've been fired
Maybe a cultural difference here, but why would you want it any other way? If I'm notified that I'm going to be fired in 4 months, why would I bother showing up to work those 4 months? You may as well fire me now and pay me the 4 months' salary.
Are companies obligated to pay out 4 months' salary if they fire someone?
Realistically, assuming the job market is otherwise good and you're reasonably skilled, it'll be like a few weeks vacation, at least in retrospect. The times I've been laid off have been some of the nicest most relaxing times of my life, if I look back. Of course no one likes it and I'm not sure I'd want to be laid off in this job market.
If you quit, or are fired for cause, you are not eligible for unemployment compensation. If you are laid off for "lack of work", then yes.
so of course the first result that comes up is _union_ violence -- against the companies/authorities. :-D
https://www.google.com/search?q=history+of+labor+violence+in...
at least wikipedia is not biased in favor of the people who own the country.
"Layoffs" implies that it's a temporary shutdown of production and that workers will retained when business conditions improve.
