The whole point of the original comment was that Noah fires to stop people's equity from vesting. If he did, sure, there's a claim that it's unethical. But since that's unlikely, what do you have left???

That Noah fired some people who may or may not have deserved it. Happens every day. Anyone on HN who builds a company of any size will probably have employees mad at them for doing the same.

Employment is a MARKET. Both parties are "at will"...

If an employee quits without a good reason, is that scummy?

Should the scumminess of it depend on how it "affects" the COMPANY?

People quit every day to earn 10% more across the street, work with better technology, walk away from technical debt, shorten their commute, get away from a dreary office or smelly coworkers. Whatever.

There's no morality in it, good or bad. And employers should feel free to fire people who aren't fitting and/or cannot be kept for whatever reason.

As far as I can tell, that's the AppSumo situation. If you want to call that "scummy" feel free, but I don't see any logic in it.

...and they didn't deserve to get fired a month earlier? Or 3 days later (after vesting)? There is no such thing as a coincidence when money is involved.

In my experience, the deadline of something like that is merely a forcing function to act on a problem that you've let go too long. I have yet to meet an entrepreneur that moves too fast on firings.

That said, I learned early on in my career that you can't make mistakes or have bad optics with people's comp. There's no way to recover from a mistake like that, and people do not give you the benefit of the doubt.

...and "forcing function" is weasel words for "screw them before they vest". If you use the vesting date for any firing decision, that is a moral lapse.