Technically, no.
“Layoff” is a form of “terminated without prejudice”.
“Fired” means “terminated with prejudice”.
It can make a difference.
This was more a matter of jargon that something you hear everyday, but:
When the various NASA people were speaking about the Columbia disaster in the hours and days afterwards, some of them consistently said, “At such-and-such time, this sensor registered and off-scale low.”
That might seem proper among the tekkie types, but it makes more sense to say, “We lost this sensor” or “This sensor stopped transmitting.”
“At such-and-such time, this sensor registered an off-scale low.”
Even in the non-profit world, sickening jargon rules OK. My current pet hates are “buy-in”–making sure everyone in the hierarchy agrees with whatever pet project is being pushed at the time–and “pipeline.” AS A VERB!