US Tech Sector Announces Most Job Cuts in Nearly Two Years - Bloomberg.com

Ah, the tech sector's relentless romance with efficiency continues. US technology companies announced 38,242 planned job cuts in May — the highest since August 2024, according to Bloomberg. Because nothing says 'confident about the future' quite like showing 38,242 people the door, all in the name of ramping up AI spending. The logic is impeccable: replace expensive humans with expensive algorithms that may one day replace even more humans. It's a self-fulfilling prophecy wrapped in a press release.

And what a charmingly circular economy this is. Companies cut staff to plow cash into AI, which then gets used to automate the very roles they just cut. The 38,242 figure is just a down payment on the next round of 'efficiency gains.' Bloomberg notes this is the most since August 2024, which tells you the pattern is not a blip: it's a feature. Every spike in AI investment is met with a spike in pink slips, and somehow the industry keeps a straight face.

But fear not — those displaced workers can always retrain for the booming field of 'AI ethics' or 'prompt engineering,' right? The gallows humour writes itself. Meanwhile, the executives who approved the cuts will be on conference stages next week talking about 'human-centric innovation' with perfect sincerity. If there's a more reliable indicator of impending social friction than record job cuts paired with record AI spend, we'd love to see it — just send it to our LinkedIn inbox, which is about to be very, very quiet.