How to Avoid Being Replaced
491: AI, layoffs, and a potential extinction of white-collar work
Morning guys.
Going to be a long week. Equity volatility is back and crypto keeps dumping (yes I am still bullish). Michael Burry is short PLTR 0.00%↑ and NVDA 0.00%↑ and it seems many are starting to speculate that the “bubble” we find ourselves in is about to pop.
We will get to those topics in Thursday’s post.
Today however, we have an important piece covering AI, the job market, and determining if your role is safe in the near future.
Most wouldn’t know it, but job prospects for young people and continued roles for corporate veterans are at risk.
As we approach the holiday season it’s a crucial time to take stock of where your career and job sit on the risk spectrum considering what we have seen taking place this year:
Is your job safe from AI?
Do you have a backup plan?
How quickly could you get a new job or role?
Are things seeming “off” or “different” at your company or organization?
It is no secret that artificial intelligence has started to change the way the corporate world and job market function. College students are using AI for papers and essays, salespeople are using it for outreach, banks are leveraging it for grunt work, and entire sub sectors like marketing and ad work are now entirely automated in some companies.
By now it is evident that AI is not a passing trend. AI is quickly changing job availability, the types of roles people can maintain, and future prospects of job security for millions.
On top of that you have a wildly unpredictable economic environment that has become more murky with an extended government shutdown and lack of accurate data.
I know that there are camps of people, who in the past, looked to my calls for sovereignty, side hustles, and plan B’s and thought to themselves:
“I will never need any of that, I am a corporate man for life”.
“I will always have a day job on lock”
Think again.
The truth is, the majority of white collar and corporate roles that exist as of today, will not exist in their current form or scale in the future. It just isn’t going to happen.
All industries are undergoing rapid transformation and shifts to structures that are leaner and more efficient.
It no longer makes sense for many of these companies to hire “bulk analyst classes” or “incoming consultants”. Those days are dwindling.
We now have a race for lofty valuations, implementation of AI and growth tech, and a race to announce the next best partnership that bumps share price to unbelievable ranges.
In the past several months alone we’ve seen the following:
Morgan Stanley is cutting roughly 2,000 positions, about 2–3% of its workforce, in an efficiency drive linked to automation and expanding AI use across research, compliance, and operations
Major banks are expected to slash up to 200,000 jobs over the next few years as AI and automation reshape back-office, middle-office, and support functions across Wall Street and global finance firms
Amazon has axed around 14,000 corporate roles this fall, citing “AI transformation” and internal restructuring to go leaner and redirect capital toward automation and robotics
Microsoft trimmed roughly 4% of its global staff (around 9,000 roles) after massive AI spending sprees with $80B+ poured into infrastructure, chips, and model integration, while quietly consolidating overlapping human positions
Intel is cutting over 20% of its workforce, a broad restructure aimed at stripping out middle management layers and realigning toward AI- and chip-focused operations
Autodesk trimmed about 9% of its global workforce (~1,350 jobs) as it pivots toward a subscription-based model and invests more heavily in AI platforms and automation
Salesforce cut roughly 4,000 customer-support jobs as AI chatbots and agent-automation systems began handling a much larger portion of inbound interactions
This is a handful of major recent updates.
Tech layoffs aren’t isolated. Over 100,000+ jobs have been slashed across major firms in 2025 as automation replaces routine work and “reorganization” becomes corporate code for AI substitution.
Whether it is AI, the economy, or companies simply becoming leaner, there are serious risk factors at play, even for people who have traditionally thought that their roles were super secure and insulated from these kinds of things.
Throughout my corporate career I had a taste of everything — leaving on my own for something new, feeling walls closing in because of low revenue/targets, thriving during good times, and hopping to the next best thing strategically.
I became quite adaptive in my nearly 10 years in corporate and never had illusions about how the game was played.
It’s entirely transactional and extractive.
Some people (who get too accustomed to one thing) never get the luxury of having to “figure it out” on the fly. I call it a luxury because you become tougher, more flexible, and able to power through unexpected curve balls that might come your way in life and in your professional endeavors.
The majority of people would be (and will be) utterly lost and battered if they were to unexpectedly lose their job tomorrow. Today’s guide serves a multitude of purposes:
Give an accurate read on where the job market stands
Cover updates on which roles and industries are being impacted by AI
Review resiliency and hedging tactics for your job/profession (provide a basic flow chart for identifying if your job or career is at risk for automation)
Hear from a headhunter on the state of the hiring market and how to stay ahead of layoffs, finding the next thing, and keeping up with your network
I think this is an excellent time to revisit this topic, particularly if we do see a sustained market pullback or black swan event.
The professional world has changed RAPIDLY since Covid 19.
Those who have kept up with Arb Letter for a number of years know that there’s a reason I stress independence so much. It can often prove to be a grave mistake to place too much confidence in the permanence of any role or career in the corporate world.
Trust and legitimacy of many institutions came under question and scrutiny the last several years. Now, we are watching in real time as these companies ruthlessly cull their ranks and optimize their workforces for the coming decades with little regard for loyalty, tenure, or what happens to employees once they’re let go.
There is a stretch of time coming that will undoubtedly leave many people clueless on how to make a living, keep steady work, or bring in a consistent paycheck.
Let’s talk about how to prepare for this new reality, which roles are safest, and what you can do to plan for worst case scenarios.