I am a “skilled professional” in a scientific field. I make an OK six-figure income and the benefits that my occupation provides for my family (wife and 2 kids) are what keeps me going. I worked for a large global company for the past 7 years climbing the occupational ladder. Building a long term career within that company was something that I was content with because I had great growth potential, great health care (90% covered employee/family, yes yes, should be free, but his is US, ill take what i can get), great compensation, and the environment isnt great, but it ive been in worse in this field.
So here is where shit gets fucky: The company that I worked for the past 7 years has gone bankrupt (CH11), which is fine, the severance structure per my contract would have been 8 months pay. Plus i can collect unemployment, I wouldnt have to dip into any kind of savings for a year at least, plenty of time to find a new job with my resume. Since it is CH11 and not CH7 the company was trying to liquidate as much as they could in order to save it from going to creditors (ultimately it failed and now they are in the hands of creditors with a stalking horse bid that does not look good). Since they were liquidating, they sold my site of for a major loss (at least 20M undervalued for the site… AT LEAST).
I do not know what went on behind closed doors between my former company and the company that bought my site, but something fucky had to have been going on. As soon as the sale of the site was announced my old company communicated to us that if equal employment was offered from the buyer of the site, then we would not be eligible for the severance package. Also, if we denied the employment, we would not be eligible for unemployment as well. Needless to say 90% of people were offered employment. No interviews were given, no resumes were submitted, nothing was known about the individuals that they were hiring into their company. The lucky 10% of people got severance packages, and I wasnt one of them.
It really seems like the former company sold this us off with the site as part of the deal. The impression I have is that the former company said if you take on XXX amount of individuals we will sell the site to you for insanely cheap. The former company did this to avoid several million dollars in severances that they would have had to paid. The current company accepted the deal because the site was a steal and at the very least they could flip it to a holdings company or another company and make a great profit. The new company is a far cry from my old company. The site went from being owned by a well-established global corporation to now it is owned by a startup funded by chinese investors.
I am having a hard time figuring out how my employment is considered “equal”. My title and salary has not changed. But my compensation package is definitely worse than before. The healthcare is terrible and expensive and they dont match 401K (before I was getting 6%). Also, despite the close to 10% inflation rate this year, they did not have the decency to give me a raise. Claiming that “I am part of a new company now and we do not have enough data on my performance to justify an salary increase.”
I feel as if I was sold off as a property rather than an person. I have dealt with acquisitions before and they have never been this shady. Before getting offered employment i was interviewed, I had to submit a resume, and they reviewed my transcripts and did a background check, essentially like onboarding a new company. This time the director of the department that I was being hired into had a piece of paper with my employment terms on them. She said I have 24 hours to sign, if i do not sign then my job goes on the internet, i get no severance, and no unemployment. I legitimately feel like I have been forced into employment because I had no other choice other than no income at all. I also do not support the business model of the company and the fact that it is funded by chinese money (with all the human rights violations and whatnot id rather not be a part of helping the chinese goverment profit.)
Last night my wife has noticed my distress and told me to just walk out. Which is a relief to know that she supports me, but I find it hard to take a leap like that when I have a wife and two kids that rely on me to provide income. And since I am in a specialized field with a higher pay scale the job hunt process can take months. I dont know what to do, my mental and physical health is suffering. I almost want to consult an attorney to find out if any of this was illegal. End of rant, thanks for reading.