I think AI is being used as an excuse for layoffs rather than the cause. Companies don’t have the cash and times got a bit too rich. This is the cyclical pull back that has been going on for decades.
Some of this has nothing to do with COVID boom numbers. Some are bailing water as fast as they can (Atlassian, et al), some are treading water and betting on future returns from AI (Block), etc.
The jig was up when social media like Reddit and tiktok during the pandemic was full of posts with big tech workers gloating about getting hired for six figure salaries to sleep in and play video games at home while putting in 2 hours of work a week, obvious to anyone with two neurons to rub together that it was a too-good-to-be-true unsustainable bubble that's gonna pop and trigger a brutal reset on the job market.
Further reinforced with Elon firing 80% of Twitter and the website didn't stop working, reminding big tech CEOs that they can also start looking into trimming the overhiring fat in their back yard, with no operational loss.
Reinforce that with wall street rewarding mass layoff with share price going up, contrary to the pandemic rewards of shares going up with over hiring, and you have the perfect storm.
AI and the idea of it replacing jobs, has nothing to dow with this, it's just 10 years of ZIRP reawarding every unprofitable bullsit SaaS start-up, and 10 years of "just learn to code bro" where every shoeshine boy became a coder so now tech companies hiring are spoiled for choice.
Edit: Oh I forgot, add to that the increased of offshoring to places with cheaper labor thanks to the normalisation of remote work making it an even perfecter(is that a word?) storm on why an average programmer's labor has way less value.
If you can show that the death of Franz Ferdinand necessarily caused tech layoffs in 2026, I'll listen. I don't think you can, though.
If there really is all this latent untapped need to drive a Jevron's effect software explosion that will keep developers employable, why would so many profitable companies be laying off so many workers into the transition?
The AI caused the developer productivity to increase (similar to other two big SW engineering productivity jumps - compilers and open source), which gives them more leverage over employers (capital). Things that you needed a small team to build (and thus more capital) you can now do in a single person.
In the long run, this will mean more software being written, possibly by even larger number of people (shift on the demand curve - as price of SW goes down demand increases). But before that happens, companies have a knee-jerk reaction to this as they're trying to take back control over developers, while assuming total amount of software will stay constant. Hence layoffs. But I think it's shortsighted, the companies will hurt themselves in the long run, because they will lay off people who could build them more products in the future. (They misunderstood - developers are not getting cheaper, it's the code that will.)
Not in some AI "dey took er jerbs" kind of way, but because businesses are turning their investment focus towards AI-related ventures, like building data centres, and away from investments that require tech workers. Non-residential construction jobs, for example, have surged.
FWIW, I read this as equating a particular regional accent with stupidity.
I imagine it wasn't intentional, but it's something to consider.
In their defense, they make fun of nearly everyone. But they definitely were mocking White Southerners there.
2020 and 2023 both had serious layoff spikes, but the 2023 spike trailed off to an asymptote that we're still hovering around.
AFAICT, the general populace is anxious about AI. So, the news knows they can get clicks with “You are right to be afraid. AI bad.” Meanwhile, CEOs know they can get stock boosts by saying “We are so AI we don’t need expenses. Infinite ROI!”
Put together we’re getting a ton of scary reporting on what looks like a quite normal business cycle. And, everyone being afraid to hire is the only thing actually making it self-fulfilling.
Remember before Covid many a company deadweight showing us the vast amounts of unwork they did at their companies on their YouTube videos? Proudly showing how idle they were?
Not all the firings are deadweight but a lot are. There is also a general tightening of budgets and people who are part of dead-end programs that are being let go. When the economy was hotter companies would keep these people to add at the margins; I think now that money is still tight they’re not keeping that luxury.
If interest rates are 3.8%, the company needs at least a 3.8% return every year on your yearly compensation to justify your job.
Grocery stores have slim margins, but if you make 10k after selling 1M worth of stock buy turn over that stock 12 times a year that’s ~12% annual ROI not 1%.
From day one, Social Security was a "new money pays old money" scheme, the one thing that makes it Ponzi-like.
To be fair, the boomers got screwed in the 1980's SS reform to pay for their parents (but had it sweet before), so maybe this is just paying it forward.
1. Google is getting so much productivity out of their AI that they need fewer people.
2. Google is spending so much on AI they can’t afford to keep the people they need.
3. Google is spending so much on AI that they can't afford to keep paying people, but they are ok with this because they are convinced the AI investment will replace the people at an eventual cost savings.
The reason for this has nothing to do with how productive the devs are per se and everything to do with bloated decision making processes and extremely high communication overhead. “AI” does nothing for that (in fact, I’m seeing integrated suggestions in ticket tracking tools making things spammier and reducing quality of tickets, so if anything, it’s making it worse)
Crazy thing is, I delivered optimizations that saved 1m USD over the last 12 months, with another optimization in-flight that would save another 1m USD. I thought that was enough to protect me from layoffs/PIPs - I guess no one was counting.
Internal survey showed that people saved a self-reported average of 4 hours per week using AI - which sounds about right. AI is just an excuse for layoffs which IMO CEOs are trying to use to recover share prices from the SaaS-pocalypse. Looks like layoffs aren't hitting the same for stock prices as they once were.
bearjaws•1h ago
Apparently 20% to be laid off soon.
https://www.reuters.com/business/world-at-work/meta-planning...
PlanksVariable•1h ago
jameskilton•1h ago
It would be sad if it wasn't so unbelievably destructive to everything it touches.
abuani•1h ago
csimon80•53m ago
jimbob45•19m ago
chaostheory•1h ago
simianwords•1h ago
MSFT_Edging•1h ago
nickthegreek•1h ago
12_throw_away•48m ago
10xDev•34m ago
throw-the-towel•12m ago
yacin•1h ago
tim-projects•52m ago
The basic issue is none of it seems to be making any money when it ends up in products and services.
Main reason there seems to be that their walled garden approach is tolerated at best. They just aren't very good at it outside of a feed.
paxys•1h ago
ProllyInfamous•51m ago
jordanb•30m ago
But other than that, it was all about working in a digital office, being advertised to, etc. They had this scene where one of Zuck's definitely-real friends is excited about "this new street art" on the digital wall that jumps off the wall and they interact with it. Imagine having popup ads that jump up at you when you're walking (gliding?) down the street!
HDThoreaun•27m ago
twelve40•18m ago
kypro•53m ago
nradov•24m ago
oneseventwonine•17m ago
badgersnake•31m ago
tinyhouse•23m ago
As for Meta, I give Mark credit for trying, even if he failed so far with all the VR stuff. The main disappointment is about Llama cause it's clearly an execution problem. With Meta's investments in AI throughout the years, not being able to compete with Anthropic and OpenAI is a big failure.