In recent weeks, the tech world has been abuzz with AI “jobpocalypse” warnings. Microsoft AI chief Mustafa Suleyman warned that white-collar workers have a year to 18 months before they face widespread job displacement. Former presidential candidate Andrew Yang and JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon concurred.
These threats have caused many professional workers’ stomachs to churn as they fear for their heads. Now, Jack Dorsey’s payments firm, Block, has made a move that vindicates some of the fears of the AI doomers.
The Block founder announced Thursday the company would be laying off nearly half its workforce, cutting 4,000 employees, down to just under 6,000 workers from over 10,000.
Dorsey didn’t mince words in an X post announcing the cuts, tying the layoffs directly to an efficiency boost from the company’s AI implementation. “We’re already seeing that the intelligence tools we’re creating and using, paired with smaller and flatter teams, are enabling a new way of working which fundamentally changes what it means to build and run a company,” he wrote.
Block’s layoffs mark one of the most significant and bold AI-driven workforce reductions yet in S&P 500 history.
