It was a symptom of the bubble economy, particularly in e-commerce and online services, that materialized during the pandemic and was egged on by a series of mistakes made by the Fed.
Demand looked like it was growing massively with no end in sight, valuations were insane, and money was easy to get.
A lot of companies didn't stop to think that maybe it was all just a bubble. So they hired to avoid missing out.
Basic things like running a sustainable business with a sane balance sheet were not scrutinized by investors. Now they are, and in the layoff emails to employees we see CEOs talking about how that is important, as if they suddenly realized it for the first time.
To be fair, some of those companies probably did make a lot more money than they would have if they hadn't taken advantage of the situation -- and they probably would have been punished by their shareholders if they didn't.
Demand looked like it was growing massively with no end in sight, valuations were insane, and money was easy to get.
A lot of companies didn't stop to think that maybe it was all just a bubble. So they hired to avoid missing out.
Basic things like running a sustainable business with a sane balance sheet were not scrutinized by investors. Now they are, and in the layoff emails to employees we see CEOs talking about how that is important, as if they suddenly realized it for the first time.
To be fair, some of those companies probably did make a lot more money than they would have if they hadn't taken advantage of the situation -- and they probably would have been punished by their shareholders if they didn't.