Tech companies fired thousands of workers. Researchers studied the carnage. The verdict: this automation wave differs from previous ones. F*cking groundbreaking.
Past automation replaced assembly line workers and factory jobs. AI replaces people who send emails for a living. The studies call this "different." They mean worse. A robot took your grandpa's job welding car frames and he retrained as a truck driver. AI takes your job writing marketing copy and you retrain as what exactly? A prompt engineer? That job also gets automated in eighteen months.
Multiple studies reached this conclusion independently. They used different methodologies. They analyzed different sectors. All arrived at the same place: white-collar workers are f*cked in a novel way that requires its own category of research. Someone got grant money to prove that ChatGPT writing your performance reviews represents a "fundamentally distinct labor disruption." Yourtuition dollars at work.
The studies note that previous automation cycles created new job categories. This one might not. AI doesn't need supervisors. Doesn't need trainers. Doesn't need the guy who fixes it when it breaks because it just regenerates itself. The research carefully avoids saying "permanent unemployment" but that's what all the charts show if you squint.
Tech workers saw the layoffs coming. Didn't matter. They still showed up to work on the algorithm that would replace them. Spent years optimizing the model. Celebrated each benchmark. Posted about it on LinkedIn with that insufferable "humbled to announce" framing. Then got a Slack message from HR and a severance package that assumes they'll find equivalent work.
The studies recommend retraining programs and safety nets. Cool. Your next job is teaching AI how to do your last job faster.
Photo by Simon Kadula on Unsplash
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