Big Tech promised AI would disrupt labor, just not like this
Oracle is reportedly laying off thousands, adding to an already long list of tech giants cutting staff while spending hundreds of billions on AI data centers.
An Oracle office building in Redwood City, California. The company is reportedly cutting thousands of jobs. (Getty Images)
Oracle is reportedly laying off thousands of employees, adding to an already long list of tech giants cutting staff while spending hundreds of billions of dollars on AI data centers.
Microsoft laid off 15,000 people last year. Amazon axed 16,000 jobs in January. Atlassian let go of 10% of its workforce as part of its AI pivot. Block shed 40% of its staff, claiming AI could do much of the basic coding work it needed.
Perhaps we shouldn't be surprised: Big Tech executives have long warned that AI would lead to job losses. They perhaps just forgot to mention those losses wouldn't necessarily come from actual AI tools replacing human workers but rather from the same old boring Business 101 reasons as the pre-AI era.
Author, A World Without Work
The layoff numbers are real, but the causal story is wrong. Most of these job cuts are a correction from pandemic-era overhiring, not evidence that AI agents are replacing software engineers. The actual displacement effect will be slower and harder to see, concentrated in mid-level knowledge work where tasks are routine enough to automate but complex enough that companies aren't yet confident doing it...
Read full analysis →What nobody is talking about is the second-order hiring freeze. Companies aren't just cutting staff, they're not replacing the people who leave. The net headcount reduction is two to three times what the layoff headlines suggest...
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