They aren’t hiring back laid off employees. Even if the person cut was A plus talent. They will hire from within. They don’t want to pay more and use it as a quick hook layoff fail safe. The direction is to also low ball salaries right now. Probably for the reason above. Raises this year, probably need to plan on not getting those as well.
No more hiring the best candidate. The message was, hire the cheapest.
Don’t shoot the messenger. Passing along because I know really really talented people that were let go that have hopes of coming back.