Meta Begins Massive California Layoffs

An earlier round of layoffs cost roughly 200 San Francisco Bay area workers their jobs in April. More layoffs may follow as Meta re-orients is business model toward artificial intelligence. Amazon, Snap, Block and other tech companies have continued to slash their workforces this year, flooding the job market. All in all, the situation for tech workers looks pretty grim.

Economists wonder whether the federal safety net is adequately prepared to deal with looming AI job losses. In the immediate future, though, California Labor Law may provide some better remedies for displaced workers.

AI ate my job. Now what do I do?

Even apart from the economic impact, losing a job can be devastating. Job loss, especially if it leads to long-term unemployment, is linked to:

• lower job satisfaction and decreased earnings on re-employment;
• declines in psychological and physical well-being;
• social withdrawal;
• family disruption; and
• lower levels of children’s attainment and well-being.

Many of us have seen this happening. The damage is generational.

A labor lawsuit is not the first thing that comes to mind. But there are situations in which lawsuits can help to address the hardships caused by lack of notice or discriminatory decision-making about who gets fired.

60-day notice gives workers a running start

Having adequate notice of an impending layoff can make a huge difference in softening the blow of unemployment and in the search for a new job.

The federal Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) Act requires that most employers with 100 or more employees provide notice 60 days before planned closings and mass layoffs of employees. California’s WARN act is even more generous, covering employers of 50 or more employees and requiring them to also notify workers 60 days before a relocation 100 miles away from their current workplace. In addition, Cal-WARN requires that the employer notify the Local Workforce Development Board (LWDB) and the chief elected official of each city and county government within which the termination, relocation or mass layoff occurs.

As of January 2026, the law also requires employers to provide a functioning email and telephone number for the employer and the employee’s LWDB and a description of the statewide food assistance program known as CalFresh. The layoff notice must include contact information for the CalFresh benefits helpline and a link to the CalFresh internet website.

The last requirement recognizes the brutal reality of unemployment for many workers – yes, even software engineers facing a tight future.

Employers who violate Cal-WARN face significant penalties, including back pay and benefits for employees for up to 60 days, civil penalties of up to $500 per day, and potential liability for attorney fees.

California Senate Bill 951, known as the “AI Job Killer Notice Act,” would expand the notification period to 90 days specifically for workers whose jobs are eliminated due to AI or automation when those layoffs affect twenty-five or more workers or twenty-five percent of the workforce.

Wait! Why have all the people of color (pregnant people, workers over age 40,…etc.) been fired?

This is where the protections of California’s Fair Employment and Housing Act (FEHA) kick in. FEHA, like Title VII of the Civil Rights Law and other civil rights laws, protects the working rights of people, regardless of:

• race or color;
• religion;
• sex/gender (including pregnancy), sexual orientation, gender identity/expression;
• age 40 and older;
• ancestry or national origin;
• disability, medical condition or genetic information;
• marital status; and
• military/veteran status.   

This includes decisions about terminations.

But this is more complicated than it looks. Imagine that your middle manager has been told to reduce staff by ten percent to implement a company restructuring decision. Few employers are now so legally unsophisticated as to disproportionately target FEHA-protected workers.

But what if the decision maker is not a person, but an algorithm? What if the criteria for the termination decision are apparently objective and applied to all employees, but which have a disparate impact on employees within the protected groups? This is where the law is developing.

California’s “No Robo Bosses” Senate Bill

The core provisions of SB 947 would prohibit employers from using “automated decision systems” (ADS) as the sole basis for making consequential employment decisions about current employees, specifically decisions to discharge or discipline workers. The bill defines ADS broadly as any “computational process, including one derived from machine learning, statistics, or other data processing or artificial intelligence techniques, that makes a decision or facilitates human decision making.”

A “natural person” must make the final decision when AI is involved in firing or disciplining workers. Employers cannot delegate these decisions entirely to automated systems. The bill was still pending in the state senate as of late April. Ironically, this bill, if enacted, may protect your middle manager.

Joanne Barela v. Deloitte Consulting LLP

Currently pending in the Northern District of California, this California labor lawsuit accuses Deloitte of discriminating against workers who took parental leave. Her lawsuit advances the argument that an ostensibly neutral company-wide performance evaluation formula had a disparate impact on workers who took parental leave because their economic performance over a period of less than 12 months was compared to the economic achievement of employees who had been present during the entire year.

Meta’s layoffs may be just the tip of the AI layoffs this year. California workers should make sure that they know their options.