I remember discussing this coming wave with my co-worker and running partner about 15 years ago, right before or during the crash. We'd chat during our runs. I was so naive. I looked around and saw a crisis that Megacorp was about to walk into, as a brain drain would severely impact the company.
Megacorp saw it as a good opportunity to get rid of expensive employees (healthcare too), and boy oh boy, did they ever, by all means possible. Replaced with offshore labor or younger people.
But I wasn't wrong. Megacorp's revenue and stock has been flat since then. It was a crisis and still is a crisis. They just deny it.
My Megacorp did the same thing. They changed the retirement program to urge old folks to bail out before the changes became effective. At one time, you could max out pension/health care benefits as early as age 54. They changed it to age 65 as the only way to maximize retirement benefits (but gave a few years until that change was in force.)
They sold off manufacturing sites and negotiated that Megacorp's older employees would stay with the new owners - for a year at least - thus cutting older folks. Of course, it wasn't official that older folks would stay - it just "happened" that way and newer folks moved with Megacorp for the most part.
Eventually (18 months after I ER'd) they even offered a "package" to get rid of even more of the older folks. They carefully "kept" the "good" people and got rid of the "also rans." I left (an also ran??) because Megacorp shuffled people around and changed their w*rk assignments - maybe (maybe not?) to encourage us oldsters to leave.
In any case, Megacrop suffered for a while but has recently "exploded" in revenue and stock price. IOW by doing the dirty deed of cutting old w*rkers, Megacorp paid a price BUT came out the other side much leaner and meaner and much more profitable.
I won't touch the "morality" of the situation. I think Megacorp played it right down the line of age discrimination (they always did have good lawyers.) I just thank God that I was ready to go and got to do it on my terms. Some of my old friends got caught in the "musical chairs" game and went through real trauma (though some came out the other side even better off.)
My point: Sometimes, big bloated, old companies know what they are doing and even though it seems unfair to old people like me, they do what they have to stay on top of the game and come out better on the other side. Like I said, I am so thankful that it w*rked so well for me. I was literally waiting for an excuse to leave (like - not enjoying my j*b any longer - and they made that happen for me.
)
The REALLY good news? I kept a bunch of my stock that Megacorp gave me over the years. Though it's been volatile here during the last couple of weeks, it's still worth the equivalent of my last 10 years of salary. So I feel as if I won the game - and so did Megacrop. Sometimes it happens that way I guess though YMMV.
