The Robots Aren't Here Yet. So Why Are the Layoffs?

The Headlines Are Everywhere

You’ve seen them. That little jolt you get when you scroll past a headline about thousands of jobs being cut. You might even feel a flicker of fear. A quiet question that whispers, is my job safe?

It feels like every week another big name announces a "restructuring." And more and more, a new reason is being whispered for these massive changes. Artificial Intelligence.

The numbers are staggering. Giant tech companies have cut around 180,000 jobs. Apple trimmed sales positions. Amazon let go of about 14,000 corporate workers. These aren't small adjustments. These are seismic shifts. And it’s not just happening in Silicon Valley. Down in Australia, a software company called WiseTech Global is cutting 2,000 jobs. That’s nearly a third of its entire global workforce.

It’s easy to picture a sci-fi movie scene. A relentless, efficient machine taking over a human's desk. But that's not quite what's happening. The real story is a little more complicated, and a lot more human.

It's a Bet on the Future

Here’s the twist. Most of these job cuts aren't because an AI is already doing the work better. According to the Harvard Business View, these layoffs are happening because of AI's *potential*, not its current reality.

Think of it like this. Companies are looking at the horizon and they see a storm of change coming. They believe AI is going to completely rewire how business is done. So, instead of waiting for the storm to hit, they're preparing now. They are shedding costs and reallocating money. They're taking the funds they used to spend on salaries and pouring them into developing new AI technologies.

The job losses are real. The slowed hiring is real. But it's all in anticipation of what AI *could* deliver, not what it's already doing. Companies like HP and IBM have been open about this. HP plans to cut up to 6,000 jobs by 2028, and they're pointing to AI as a key driver for that efficiency. They are making a massive bet that investing in this technology now will pay off down the road.

The Ground is Shifting

This isn't just a defensive move. It's a fundamental pivot. The CEO of WiseTech, Zubin Appoo, put it bluntly. He said AI has ended the era of manual coding. That’s a powerful statement. He is fundamentally reshaping his company, across 40 different countries, based on this belief.

And while AI isn’t the reason behind every single layoff, it’s a growing part of the story. In 2025, companies cut 1.2 million jobs, and while AI was officially cited in less than 5% of those cases, its shadow looms large. Economists at Goldman Sachs estimate that AI is already responsible for a net loss of 5,000 to 10,000 jobs every single month in the most exposed industries in the U.S.

This isn’t a story about evil robots. It’s a story about a massive, high-stakes business transformation happening in real-time. Companies are placing their chips on a future powered by AI, and that means the old way of doing things, and the jobs tied to it, are being left behind. The ground is moving under our feet, and we're all just trying to figure out where to stand.