AI Layoffs Hit 150K as Insiders Mint Billions

Tech layoffs have reached a striking pace in 2026: 363 separate rounds so far, affecting nearly 150,000 people — roughly 974 jobs a day, about 44% faster than last year. Last month alone saw around 40,000 cuts, the highest single month in two years, and AI has been cited as the leading reason for layoffs across industries for three straight months.

The concrete numbers are blunt. Block eliminated about half its staff — roughly 4,000 people. Meta let go of 8,000, around 10% of its workforce. Jack Dorsey first framed Block's cuts as a shift to 'a new way of working,' then later admitted the company had simply 'over-hired.'

The other side of the ledger

While tens of thousands of workers are shown the door, a small group is getting wealthy on a scale that's hard to picture. Cerebras Systems' IPO jumped 68%, turning co-founders Andrew Feldman and Sean Lie into billionaires. SpaceX reached a $2.1 trillion valuation, reportedly creating around 4,400 millionaires and roughly 400 centimillionaires among staff. Mark Zuckerberg bought a $170 million Miami mansion — a record for Miami-Dade County.

Venture investor Marc Andreessen put the dynamic plainly: 'Essentially, every large company is overstaffed... Now they all have the silver bullet excuse: Ah, it's AI.'

Why this matters to you

The framing is the whole game. If 'AI' is partly cover for cutting staff that leadership wanted to trim anyway, then the standard reassurance — 'just reskill and you'll be fine' — misreads what's happening. The pressure is real on the household side too: healthcare premiums are up 6–7%, insurance costs have roughly doubled since 2008, and home prices have climbed about 28% since early 2020. That gap between who absorbs the cuts and who captures the upside is what makes this a powder keg, not just a news cycle.