alt Hacker NewsWell, we don't see a slight trimming of workforces, we see 20-80% layoffs in most cases with good financial performance. You see breathless claims of AI doing all the work one year, tokenmaxxing, then less than a year later everybody says don't spend so much on AI, progress wasn't as far as we expected. You see this in what people say about AI as well - one year everybody will be jobless in 5 years, next year "actually jobs are gonna be ok".
My point is that its hard to ignore just how in-tune and well-coordinated all these people are, and I don't think it's a coincidence. If CEOs were responding to actual political, economic and company developments, you'd see far more diversity of opinion. Some you see their companies are growing and profitable and wouldn't jump on the layoff bandwagon. Others may ask "Don't we need rule of law? What happens when the other party gets in power?" and fight the administration in courts etc.
> Well, we don't see a slight trimming of workforces, we see 20-80% layoffs in most cases with good financial performance.
The overhire during ZIRP was insane though - in total it was a good nine years of zero interest rates, and between the first period (2008-2015) and the second period (2020-2022) interest rates weren't that high either. Companies battled each other hard even for people who just went through a few weeks worth of bootcamp, just to make sure the competition didn't have access to them, even if there was not much productive work that could be assigned.
And that group is where the layoffs really hit hard: people with basic training, relatively little investment both of the company into the workers and from the workers to the company and, most importantly, a skillset / allocation that just lends itself heavily to being replaced or at the very least heavily augmented by AI.
On top of that... "good financial performance" doesn't mean the balance sheets can't look even better. With C-level boni being tied to stock performance or "efficiency gains" KPIs, it's no surprise that many just look at their paycheck first, the long-term health of the company second.
> You see this in what people say about AI as well - one year everybody will be jobless in 5 years, next year "actually jobs are gonna be ok".
I don't have much hope left for anything in the field of "knowledge work" and for most of "creative work" either. Let's be real, the wide masses don't care they're being force fed with AI slop, as long as they have some brainrot to doomscroll in the evening. The only jobs relatively secure for now IMHO are the trades and wiping the arses of dying boomers in care homes. For the former, robots lack the required dexterity and force feedback, and for the latter, maybe the Japanese are willing to accept arse-wiping robots, but I heavily doubt this will be the case in Western countries any time soon.
> Some you see their companies are growing and profitable and wouldn't jump on the layoff bandwagon.
There are companies left that are actively growing and not making shovels for the AI gold diggers? Huh?
> Others may ask "Don't we need rule of law? What happens when the other party gets in power?" and fight the administration in courts etc.
A rare few, yes. But most have given up and went for appeasement instead after the first ones got mergers disrupted or otherwise punished.