Many contracts still come with a notice period. So many people have contractual rights to a notice period. No requirement by law, yes.

Most contracts with a notice period still allow the company to just pay it out and send you home on the spot.

A very small percentage of US workers have any sort of contract

Moreover, as a condition of employment, many (most?) US workers must sign an “employment agreement” which is essentially a legal document written by the company, for the company. It’s like an employment contract except with terms that only benefit the company.

Legally speaking, you always have a contract when working for someone. Even if it's implicit and oral only.

You even have a contract when you are buying a piece of candy at the newsstand.

(At least in the common law world. In eg German law technically you have one contract for the piece of candy, and one contract for each individual coin you are handing over. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abstraction_principle_(law) Germans are a bit crazy.)

That is NOT the case in the US. That’s the whole point of this sub-thread.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/At-will_employment

Huh? Literally the first sentence in that article starts with

> At-will employment is a term used in U.S. labor law for contractual relationships [...]

Emphasis on contractual.

Or am I missing something?

A contract that can be dissolved at will is still a contract. Just like you can cancel your Netflix subscription at will, and it's still a valid legal contract.