I'd like to start a tip thread for any impacted folks this week. I was laid off a year ago and fortunately have managed to get enough income to not net a negative this past year, but don't kid yourself -- the market is that bad out there. No matter your seniority or valued your skills, it's in your best interest to plan for an icy winter. Make this your fulltime job as soon as you're cut to put yourself in the best possible position.
1) File for unemployment immediately, do not wait til severance pay is finished. The process takes time and there is no backpay. Now, you won't be able to get checks until you stop getting income, but despite the program lasting a year you only really get up to about 6 months of checks (if receiving no other income). But if you don't find employment a year after you signed up, you can sign right back up -- and guess what? The severance pay you had received a year prior will count as your W2 earnings, qualifying you for unemployment again. If you wait 2-6 months after that, you might not have enough W2 earnings to requalify for the same amount. TLDR: file for EDD today.
2) Get on SNAP, get an EBT card. You don't need to do this if you're still earning severance, your earnings are decided based on bills and people in your household. However, aside from grocery money, you just having an EBT card gives you discounts off of your electric bill (mine's $16 off every bill), internet bill ($30/mo account for Spectrum), even Amazon Prime membership (50% off, paid monthly).
3) Join the paramount-alumni slack channel (paramount-alumni.slack.com) and any other post layoff groups to network and find immediate support.
4) AJCC / WIOA offers free job training and tuition reimbursement for educational courses for you to pursue a new career. Wanna go take on 1-2 semesters at a University to learn something new? You could learn anything from marketing, data security, project management, business, healthcare, any fields that the growing jobs report will support. Here's the site to find the offered courses in CA: https://wioa.i-train.org/iTrain/tpd/
Now, this application process is complicated to say the least. Every Workforce office works completely independently of one another. There is no central HQ, they're not the IRS. They're more like a McDonalds -- they're all privately owned and each offers the same stuff, just some are more well supported than others, some are a little cleaner than others. Do not trust online applications through websites like CalJobs, that online application literally goes to nobody and no one -- you need to do it in person. You need to call your local Workforce office and ask them about job training/tuition reimbursement, and how much they can offer. I called 5 different offices before I found a place an hour north, funded by Goodwill, that would pay me $5000 for schooling. You'll need a LONG list of documents to bring with you e.g. proof of citizenship, birth, address, selective service, college degree (I took a photo of my degree) -- bring them all to the orientation appointment. Once approved, you just need to supply which courses you want to take to your case manager.
Good luck out there.