When I left my previous employer, the reason was absolutely arbitrary. The new one paid more. I didn't have to wait for the old company to not pay me the agreed upon salary, spend months offering them a "compensation improvement plan", and documenting their failure to follow it in fear that they might sue me for leaving for the "wrong" reason. It's amazing how people pretend at-will employment is somehow equal for both sides when only employees can actually terminate the employment at-will.

> When I left my previous employer, the reason was absolutely arbitrary. The new one paid more.

That is literally the inverse of what arbitrary means:

existing or coming about seemingly at random or by chance or as a capricious and unreasonable act of will

Now:

> I didn't have to wait for the old company to not pay me the agreed upon salary, spend months offering them a "compensation improvement plan", and documenting their failure to follow it in fear that they might sue me for leaving for the "wrong" reason. It's amazing how people pretend at-will employment is somehow equal for both sides when only employees can actually terminate the employment at-will.

Where I live you have (it's the law) to keep on working (and being paid for that work) for a certain number of weeks (depending on how long you have been working at that company). So the company can find a replacement, so you can wrap up things and pave the way for the transition. It's not rare that you can come up with an agreement that let you do that from home (because you are leaving on bad terms) or that the employee takes his vacant days or extra hours to fill up that period.

b : based on or determined by individual preference or convenience rather than by necessity or the intrinsic nature of something

I say "leaving previous employer because the new one paid more" is not an individual preference or convenient but the intrinsic nature of the decision. Maybe even motivated by necessity if more money was needed.

It's not like he chose the new company because the logo is red.

Employers rarely fire people for arbitrary reasons, then.

If by arbitrary reasons you mean a not random reason like "they cost too much" then they do it all the time.

I'm sorry, I don't understand.

Do you think that "they cost too much" is an "arbitrary" reason? Or is it the "intrinsic nature of the decision" like in the "I leave because they pay me more elsewehere" case?