What's the difference between laid off and fired?

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What's fired and what's laid off? Can a person laid off be called fired? Can a person fired be called laid off?

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van filted:
[nq:1]What's fired and what's laid off? Can a person laid off be called fired? Can a person fired be called laid off?[/nq]
"Fired" means you lost your job because you did something wrong..."laid off" means you lost your job because your job did something wrong..r

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on 23 Oct 2003:
[nq:1]What's fired and what's laid off? Can a person laid off be called fired? Can a person fired be called laid off?[/nq]
The major difference is why the employer let the employee go.

If you are fired "for cause", that means you screwed up at your job and that the employer was ostensibly justified in letting you go.

If you are laid off, that usually means that there's not enough to allow the employer to pay your wages or salary, and it might sometimes mean that you will get your old job back if the financial situation at your employer's place of business get better and the employer needs to (re)hire workers to handle the increase in business.

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[nq:1]What's fired and what's laid off? Can a person laid off be called fired? Can a person fired be called laid off?[/nq]
Sometimes people who are terminated without "just cause" are called "laid off" even if there is no intention of ever recalling them. It can be very difficult to prove "just cause" so many employers prefer to just shell out a severance package and get rid of the undesired employee. Examples of "just cause" would be theft, extreme and continued bad performance when the employer gave the employee warnings and chances to improve, drug use, serious absenteeism, violence, or sexual harassment (by the employee). As it takes time to build a case for dismissal without "reasonable" notice, this can get quite expensive and time-consuming for the employer, and can result in memo wars and such like, while still paying for the useless ****** to come in every day.
These are examples from Canada, but the UK, Hong Kong and other countries with similar employment law should be similar.

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Spehro Pefhany

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[nq:1]What's fired and what's laid off? Can a person laid off be called fired? Can a person fired be called laid off?[/nq]
Firing somebody is usually final, while a lay-off might not always be so. A news story might say "staff have been laid off for three weeks while the factory awaits new orders".
Neil

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[nq:1]What's fired and what's laid off? Can a person laid off be called fired? Can a person fired be called laid off?[/nq]
We've done this before a few times. Originally, or at an earlier stage, it seems, "laid off" meant "dismissed for purely economic reasons and subject to rehiring when those economic circumstances changed". This can only have been meaningful for jobs and industries for which there were powerful labor unions. I think the BrE equivalent is "made redundant" (whereas someone who's fired in BrE is "sacked"), but ICBWAT.
During the half-century from about 1950 to 2000 the percentage of the AmE labor force that was unionized declined to little over 10 percent, so I'm guessing that that's what led to a generalization of the meaning of "laid off" (if it's true that the earlier meaning included a "subject to recall" sense). Whatever, my understanding is that "laid off" simply means being dismissed for what the company claims are purely "economic" reasons, having nothing to do with the employee's performance.

In other respects I don't think it differs from any other sort of termination except that the dismissed employee who's officially dismissed for bad behavior might not be able to get unemployment benefits from the state. I think the tendency for bad-behavior dismissals to not be characterized officially as such has also led to a reduction in any real distinction between being laid off and getting fired; in common speech "getting fired" might be used for both, but I think "getting fired" still carries a greater sense of employee fault.
In unionized jobs the "subject to recall" sense of "lay off" may still be meaningful.

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[nq:2]What's fired and what's laid off? Can a person laid off be called fired? Can a person fired be called laid off?[/nq]
[nq:1]We've done this before a few times. Originally, or at an earlier stage, it seems, "laid off" meant "dismissed for ... labor unions. I think the BrE equivalent is "made redundant" (whereas someone who's fired in BrE is "sacked"), but ICBWAT.[/nq]
'Made redundant' in the UK means permanent dismissal with, subject to length of sevice, some compensatory remuneration. It applies when a person's job no longer exists or when there are too many people performing similar duties. 'Lay off' implies a temporary (often seasonal) relief from duty, no compensation involved.
If you're made redundant, that's it as far as that employer is concerned - you need to look elsewhere for work. A lay-off contains the implication that you will be re-hired on a suitable future occasion although there is no guarantee.
'Lay-offs' have largely been replaced now with temporary contracts. The lay-off wasn't only 'meaningful' for unionised labour. It had many advantages for the employer and, indeed, a strong Union would have opposed the very concept of lay-offs.
Sneaky employers will occasionally try to declare troublesome workers 'redundant' as that is a quicker and often cheaper process than dismissing them for good cause.
In general terms, an employee may only complain of unfair dismissal after a year's employment. (Again, sneaky types dismiss workers after 11 months. Later they may rehire them - playing with fire as a Tribunal may regard such employment as 'continuous') but in some cases, no minimum period of employment is required.

John Dean
Oxford
De-frag to reply

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[nq:1]on 23 Oct 2003:[/nq]
[nq:2]What's fired and what's laid off? Can a person laid off be called fired? Can a person fired be called laid off?[/nq]
[nq:1]The major difference is why the employer let the employee go. If you are fired "for cause", that means you ... your employer's place of business get better and the employer needs to (re)hire workers to handle the increase in business.[/nq]
That is the traditional usage in England. My father was laid off in 1931 as the effects of the Wall Street crash hit his employer, and was rehired by the same company in the same job in 1938.

wrmst rgrds
Robin Bignall
Quiet part of Hertfordshire
England
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/docrobin/homepage.htm

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[nq:1]That is the traditional usage in England. My father was laid off in 1931 as the effects of the Wall Street crash hit his employer, and was rehired by the same company in the same job in 1938.[/nq]
Lemme guess: The Nottinghamshire subsidiary of International Business Machines? Yup, they went through a rough time in the 'Thirties trying to get people to buy all those punchcard machines, but the War soon solved that problem (NTTAWWTWHSTP).

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[nq:2]What's fired and what's laid off? Can a person laid off be called fired? Can a person fired be called laid off?[/nq]
[nq:1]We've done this before a few times. Originally, or at an earlier stage, it seems, "laid off" meant "dismissed for ... greater sense of employee fault. In unionized jobs the "subject to recall" sense of "lay off" may still be meaningful.[/nq]
The restoring of seniority is another benefit in recalls to unionized jobs.
Skitt (in Hayward, California)
www.geocities.com/opus731/

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[nq:1]The restoring of seniority is another benefit in recalls to unionized jobs.[/nq]
There's that **** word again. I had to read the sentence twice to make sense of it. My educational prejudices also give me problems with "degas."

What's the difference between laid off and fired?

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