For now, expect that to be clawed back severely over the next few years.
I’m having to continuously move up and closer to the “stakeholders”.
Your "ability to get a job" is not what put money into your bank account twice a month. Your employer did.
I told my wife as soon as I had the meeting with my manager at Amazon back in 2023 about my “take $40K severance and leave immediately or try (and fail) to work through the PIP”. She asked me what were going to do? I said I’m going to take the $40K and we are going to the US Tennis Open as planned in three weeks. I called an old manager who didn’t have a job for me. But he threw a contract my way for a quick AWS implementation while I was still interviewing.
I doubt very seriously if my job fell out from under me tomorrow, someone wouldn’t at least offer me a short term contract quickly.
This is extremely unusual in general, not at all typical.
Here, on Hacker News, we have an unusually high proportion of high earners, and I'd guess a lot of FIRE people like me (and I infer, you), but the median US person has $8k, about 3 months, of savings: https://www.fool.com/money/research/average-savings-account-...
I could not guess either the income nor the savings distribution of those 14k Amazon departures. Also, reports suggest most of these people will have a chance to find a different role within Amazon.
But I have that amount in liquid cash because I’m an empty nest boomer with my wife who had a house built in 2016 in the burbs of Atlanta that I sold for twice the amount I paid for it in 2024 and downsized to a condo in Florida.
Before 2020, my only security was my ability to get a job fast.
But honestly anyone who expected loyalty from Amazon was like the old woman who took care of the snake. They should have been saving.
And I’m not at all FIRE, I’ll be realistically working until 65. Don’t cry for me. I work remotely and my wife and I travel all of the time including doing the digital nomad thing off an on where we are gone for months at a time.
In fact, ten days after getting my “take severance package and leave immediately or try to work through a PIP (and fail)” meeting, I had three full time offers. I’m no special snowflake. I keep my resume updated, my network strong, skills in sync with the market, 9-12 months in savings in the bank.
Whether you are an enterprise developer or BigTech in the US you are on average making twice the median income in your area. There is usually no reason for you not to be stacking cash.
And equity in startups are statistically worthless and illiquid - unlike the RSUs you get in public companies that you can sell as soon as they vest.
As far as an “annuity”, you should be taking advantage that excess cash you get and saving it. But why would you want an “annuity” based on the performance of a specific company? I set my preference to “sell immediately” when my RSUs in AMZN vested and diversified.
Fortunately after the ACA, you can get insurance on the private market regardless of preexisting condition (I lost my job once before the ACA. It was a nightmare) or pay for COBRA. Remember that savings I said everyone should have?