are ambitious and have worked really hard to climb the mountain and reach the top and are now facing the realization that they'll likely need to settle for their next job and take whatever they can get because of a bad macroeconomic environment and it's extremely depressing and somewhat dehumanizing.

I've heard a lot of 'well they can wipe away their tears with their severance cash', but happiness is not all about money, this is a gut punch for a lot of people. It's being cut off from the job they loved and the people they loved working with and dealing with the fear and uncertainty that comes next.

It's not all about the money for these people. Part of some people's identities get intertwined with the company and title and layoffs are almost a death to them.

In my experience the only people happy with severance are the ones that were already planning to leave.