What if Tech Company Layoffs Aren't All About AI?

"Running a Big Tech company during Silicon Valley's AI mania may not necessarily require fewer workers or cost less," writes the Washington Post: Amazon, Google and Meta together have roughly the same number of employees now as they did during an industry-wide hiring binge in 2022, company disclosures show. Growing costs for technical workers and related expenses have often outpaced sales recently. The tech giants' big AI bet hasn't yet paid for itself.

That means AI might be killing jobs not through its labor-saving wizardry but by increasing spending so much that CEOs are pressured to find savings, giving them cover to consciously uncouple from their workforces. Marc Andreessen, a prominent start-up investor and a Meta board director, put it bluntly on a recent podcast. Big company layoffs are a fix for overstaffing and changing economic conditions, he said, but AI provides a convenient scapegoat. "Now they all have the silver bullet excuse: 'Ah, it's AI,'" he said...

"Almost every company that does layoffs is blaming AI, whether or not it really is about AI," Sam Altman, CEO of ChatGPT owner OpenAI, said at a March conference when he listed explanations for AI's unpopularity in the United States.
"Recent history suggests Big Tech companies might not be moving toward a future with fewer workers," the article concludes, "but recalibrating to spend the same, or more, on different people and projects."

So in the end, "AI might soon reduce hiring," the article acknowledges, "But the reluctance or inability of the largest tech firms to cut too deeply so far could also show that the path to making a workforce AI-ready — whatever that means — isn't a predictable straight line charting declining headcount."

Oh My God, this can't be something that's NEW

[Excelcia]

The idea that all the "AI layoffs" aren't actually because of AI, but are snow jobs... I thought this was so blatantly obvious as to be a tautology. This can't be something that is just dawning on people, can it? Please tell me that this has been obvious to most people who can rub two thoughts together in a row.

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[rudy_wayne]

The idea that all the "AI layoffs" aren't actually because of AI, but are snow jobs... I thought this was so blatantly obvious as to be a tautology. This can't be something that is just dawning on people, can it?

I'm already starting to see stories that companies are cutting back on AI because its getting too expensive and they are finding that it is cheaper to just use people.

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[drnb]

The idea that all the "AI layoffs" aren't actually because of AI, but are snow jobs... I thought this was so blatantly obvious as to be a tautology. This can't be something that is just dawning on people, can it? Please tell me that this has been obvious to most people who can rub two thoughts together in a row.

It's obvious to some, those who were actually taught critical thinking and to take what they read with a little skepticism if no credible data is accompanying a claim. I guess I should add people that also understand correlation and causation.

To those who lived through tech bubbles, who saw tech giants giants rest on their laurels and decline, who saw management focus on Wall Street rather than the market, ... sensing a convenient scape goat was something that may have come to mind.

corporate budget allocation

[will4]

AI is the once in a decade opportunity for corporate leaders to cut the budgets for legacy SaaS systems and other sacred cows.

AI is just the latest excuse acceptable to Wall Street that corporations can use to blame for lackluster revenue and blame for layoffs.

The question we and Wall Street should be asking of the bottom 450 of the S&P 500 is why is revenue not increasing as fast as inflation? And then follow by, "How is cost cutting, paper shuffling operations like stock buybacks to make financial nu

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[FlipperPA]

TRUTH! A lot of us have been screaming this from the rooftops for a very long time now. Exhibit A: https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]

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[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, plumbers, electricians and healthcare workers do work that is real and necessary. But there are 330 million people in the U.S. They can't all be plumbers and electricians and doctors. And chiropractors are a scam that shouldn't be allowed.

CEOs want to eliminate as many employees as possible because that means increased profits, which translates into the CEO getting a big raise. They believe that A.I. may be the magical solution they've been looking for. I think it will probably turn out to be

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[PCM2]

Or, if working as a health care professional has ever crossed your mind: try Chiropractic College! After an undergraduate degree (and even that isn't always necessary), you can become a Doctor in 3-4 years depending on which chiropractic college you attend.

And that should tell you all you need to know about how much your "doctor" degree will be worth.

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[ambrandt12]

Don't worry, an AI-controlled robot that can fix plumbing or electrical or hang drywalll or build a house is in the works someplace... what's stopping it?
And, don't worry... soon, we won't need chiropractors... we won't have jobs where we have to lift that drywall or haul that toilet up a flight of stairs or heft that reel of power cable around. We'll be the Blob-humans from Wall-E.

Soon (sooner than you might think), someone will design an AI house-building robot (back a trailer onto the property, trailer

layoffs happen because

[FudRucker]

Employees are like cattle as soon as you make the profit quotas for your corporate overlords for the year then your job is up for review and if you're expendable then you get laid off or fired if they can come up with a good enough reason to fire you, the people you work for don't give a damn about you and your family