Has the recession directly impacted you?

[Zip Goshboots]

^^^What I want to know is why it's so easy to get rid of people like Will Ledezma.

Is he a bad worker?
Does he often show up to work completely bombed out of his mind?
Has he (like me) brought one sexual harrassment suit after another to his company?
Does he (like Tahoe) steal from the company?
Does he (again, like me) fart constantly, and so smell up the place that at least 4 people per day die from the fumes?

Or is he, like 99.8% of Message Board Guys, perfect, and is just the victim of equal employment or a boss whose wife just found out he has been fucking the janitor and the family dog and was just out to get someone?

[Wilfredo Ledezma]

It's easy to get rid of people like me because I don't have a degree and I'm paid so little.

I don't get benefits or health insurance or shit like that (which doesn't bother me since I wouldn't want to do payroll deduct when I make so little money anyway).

If a company's having to squeeze out minor spending, then might as well get rid of the bottom of the barrell workers such as myself.

Regardless, I liked having a job that related to my career. It's tough to find those when you don't have a degree.

[Uncle Mxy]

It's easy to get rid of people like me because I don't have a degree and I'm paid so little.

Why would your having a degree and getting paid more make you less easy to get rid of? I certainly don't see that in today's economy. Unemployment is less among folks with college degrees, but their ranks have been rising much faster than blue collar unemployment.

A large local financial-sector business I'm sure you've heard of did a couple rounds of non-commission white-collar layoffs awhile back that were strictly a function of pay. The C-level execs laid off the highest-paid employee in every department, without reading performance reviews or taking input from manager/director sorts who would directly interact with these employees. That way, they maximized financial impact while minimizing headcount loss. That was deemed to be good from an "image" perspective at the time.