I’m constantly blown away at all the former ASA planes flying around the SKYW system. I saw 4 of them in one shot sitting in Denver yesterday. Sad.

I don’t think so.

I think they pay unemployment taxes (insurance) for everyone through the years, but I don’t think they pay extra if furloughs happen.

They're showing up on our flow boards in maintenance.

They pay a pre determined rate based on successful unemployment claims, the higher the ratio of claims to active employees the higher the unemployment insurance taxes they pay. So no, they don't pay directly, but unemployment taxes will increase.

Didn't they come out and say they will not dispute any unemployment claims? If the company plans to be around for any reasonable amount of time this makes zero business sense.

I guess they can always be bankrupted-and they wouldn’t need to dispute anything.

Still hard to figure why they would pay any kind of severance if they just plan to bankrupt or liquidate

Does anyone have a verifiable person that actually received a severance package? It’s one thing to not dispute unemployment... but with an airline that gives $8 turkey vouchers as a holiday bonus, I am highly doubtful anyone received a severance package. Let’s be realistic here. Names/titles or it didn’t happen.

Early retirement.

(I’d consider that a severance package.)

What do you mean? You could retire whenever you want. Maybe another thing to retain travel benefits as a “retiree.” Penalty free 401k distributions start at 59-1/2. Allowing someone to retire is no big perk. If you’re financially set you can retire tomorrow. I’m talking severance, someone getting a fat check. That’s the only thing that matters and it probably hasn’t happened.

FAs are being offered some sort of pittance for early retirement. It’s like 2 months pay or something like that.

Federal WARN Act
 

If a company is conducting a mass layoff they have to give at least 60 days notice to employees affected, unless it's a liquidation or other urgent situation. Also, some states require that the state be notified of the mass layoff. Giving people severance is so they don't sue the company; as part of severance the employee usually signs a document waiving their rights to sue. Severance is not required by law in most states.

You can go to this website to see which employers in Georgia are conducting layoffs that require notice: WARN Website Data Listings - Georgia Department of Economic Development

I don't see Expressjet anywhere on there, which probably means that as of now there is no announced plan for widespread layoffs or shutdown of the business. The people who are being terminated are probably part of a smaller number of layoffs that doesn't trigger the thresholds for Federal WARN Act reporting.