The financials aren't actually telling these companies to lay people off; the shareholders are. The macroeconomic climate is very different than the microeconomic climate; the microeconomic climate for most of these companies is "slow expansion", not "contract". In fact, many of them are still hiring even as they're laying people off because of that. But the shareholders are very much concerned, and so this is much more of a response to that.
Not really. The shareholders are being forced by the FED. None of the investments they made make sense at this interest rate level, so they want out. However ...
The theory behind the moves of the FED is that they want inflation down. How? By firing people (people will only pay prices they can afford). The FED can't fire much people. So if shareholders want the FED to back down ... they need enough people fired.
And that doesn't really work because we are fundamentally tight on the labor market for 4+ years now. Nobody fired is going to have trouble finding a new job. Maybe not the same, but they won't exactly be unemployed (although given the wages offered unemployment might be the preferable option).
It's not shareholders, it's Jerome Powell.
It's also just not going to last. The Federal government is looking at two options, in ~1.5 years. Cutting spending by 4% (and one year after that, >10%) with LESS income. Or convincing "independent" Jerome Powell to lower interest rates back to 0%.
So we'll have, let's call it 2 years of this. The FED will be as effective as an inflatable dart board, but they only have ONE tool and goddammit, they will make it work!
The financials aren't actually telling these companies to lay people off; the shareholders are. The macroeconomic climate is very different than the microeconomic climate; the microeconomic climate for most of these companies is "slow expansion", not "contract". In fact, many of them are still hiring even as they're laying people off because of that. But the shareholders are very much concerned, and so this is much more of a response to that.