Remember When "Laid Off" Didn't Mean "Permanently Fired?"

[stopbush]

When I was a lad, "laid off" was a term used mainly in the unionized trades and industries. It meant that you still had a job, but there wasn't enough work to go around, so the company you worked for laid you off TEMPORARILY. The idea was that you would go back to work once things picked up.

Nowadays, people are fired from their jobs, ie: the job is over, there will be no more work and you will not be rehired, nor will you return to your job when things pick up. But everybody calls it being "laid off" because the term retains its feeling of hope from what it USED to mean, ie: that you'd be back at that job in short order.

People are being fired these days, NOT laid off, not downsized or (yek!) "right-sized." They are being FIRED.

So, when you hear that someone has just "laid off" 20,000 employees, realize that those 20,000 people have just been fired. It's as permanent as Sarah Palin's stupidity.

[Rob H.]

1. Yup.

My aunt used to work at Ralston-Purina years ago (back before they were called Protein Technologies) and when they laid people off they would actually bring them back when they could afford to. My dad got laid off about six years ago from one of his jobs when what they were really doing was firing people--they expressly told people that even if business picked up again they wouldn't be rehired! Of course, my aunt worked at a unionized company and my dad didn't....

[sharp_stick]

2. I know what you mean

but I think the term laid off is now used because being fired has come to mean "terminated for cause".

"Laid off" is now associated with let go, usually but not always, due to financial constraints or restructuring.

I see the term "furloughed" now being used with people let go but with the possibility of being picked up again.

[eleny]

3. My dad would get laid off for a week or two a year for several years

He did sewing for a living in a factory. If he was laid off it was always just a couple of weeks at the most. Mostly, it was in between contracts that the factory owner had with stores.

I remember it was only in the late 1960s and early 1970s when dad finally retired. That was when the factories were starting to relocate south or to Asia. Before they named it "outsourcing".

[slackmaster]

5. Mine too - it happened a few times in the early '70s

He was an electronic design engineer in the aerospace industry.

[ThomWV]

4. The usual reply to being informed that someone was laid off was 'when you expect to go back?'

Because that was exactly wat was expected. Times were slow so you got laid off, then as soon as it picked back up they'd call you back and life would go on. It certainly happened all the time in the Construction trades and also in manufacturing. It might come from slow sales, it might come from retooling for a revised or new product. However it wasn't the same thing as losing a job.

[DavidDvorkin]

6. "Laid off" was also used in white-collar jobs to mean "Your job has been eliminated"

That happened to me in a number of volatile industries -- e.g., aerospace, mining. There was no intent to hire me or my coworkers back at some point.

It's still that way. If the companies are able to start hiring again in the future, they start the process from scratch with new applicants; the previous job holders have no special in.

[seabeyond]

7. i always associated with permantly fired, but... cause job not there anymore, not cause

the employee did something wrong

[Berry Cool]

8. Same here.

"Laid off," "downsized," "rightsized," whatever the catchphrase management-speak du jour happens to be, it's always meant the same thing to me...your job is history.

[TahitiNut]

9. Yup. The last one laid off was the first one re-hired ...

... and nobody else was hired until all laid-off workers were rehired or refused due to having another job. Organized labor was stronger in those days, only 40-50 years ago or so. Everyone benefited from unions, even non-union folks.

[KG]

10. for me 'laid-off' means i can collect unemployment comp.