Jack, I'm not a professional pilot, but I can draw one parallell.
Years ago, during the last recession in the UK, I know Turners/Lathe operators who were doing shifts for 1/4 of their previous hourly rate just to get some work and to get in a company's good books, hoping to be kept on full time and put onto the normal rate of pay. Even the guys who worked in the place on full wages were turning a blind eye, because they knew how tough times were for others of the same trade, and how easy management could 'performance manage' them out the door if they kicked off about it. This was in a non union place, BTW.
Seems with 50 CV's on your old employers books, it was a broadly comparable situation. Not getting into the rights/wrongs/whose prostituting their skills/etc debate, just highlighting that aviation isn't the only trade where people can get very hungry and desperate for any break they can get.