As someone fortunate enough to have a bit of excess income I was saving for an emergency situation. Boy was I lucky I was already doing that when the company literally folded and laid off everyone except 2 engineers and the original founders (~35 people down to 4). It took me a month to get an offer and another couple of weeks to get started at the new place. By that time our entire savings was gone and my partner (who makes nearly minimum wage) was keeping our bills down. I cannot possibly imagine how hard all of that would have been for a household in a less prepared situation or one with children involved