As AI menaces jobs, Amazon announces thousands of cuts

Amazon responded to allegations of thousands of upcoming job cuts following a scathing report that said the company planned to replace more than 600,000 U.S. jobs with robots.

The New York Times reported last week that it had reviewed internal documents that allegedly revealed Amazon's intentions to avoid making new hires by increasing automation. Amazon told Blaze News in response that "leaked documents often paint an incomplete and misleading picture" of company plans and that the details did not reflect its overall hiring strategy.

Less than a week later, Amazon is announcing thousands of job cuts.

'This generation of AI is the most transformative technology we've seen since the Internet.'

Reuters reported on Monday that the company is planning to cut as many as 30,000 corporate jobs as it attempts to "pare expenses" for overhiring that happened during the peak demand period during COVID-19. Reuters said that three sources provided the outlet with the inside information.

In comments to Blaze News, Amazon simply stated that it is reducing its corporate workforce, which totals approximately 14,000 roles being cut.

While there was no mention of the allegedly 16,000 remaining cuts, Amazon said the latest jobs reduction had no relation to the New York Times piece. However, a spokesman carefully articulated that Amazon sees that story as revolving around "potential future hiring of hourly employees within operations facilities."

"It's not related to today's announcement," the spokesman added, without making any mention of automated replacements.

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In a press release, Amazon said it is offering "most employees" 90 days to look for a new role within the company and will "prioritize internal candidates to help as many people as possible find new roles within Amazon."

However, despite representatives shying away from addressing a future entrenched in automation, the company openly discussed its need to "organize more leanly" ahead of upcoming changes that are a result of AI integration.

"This generation of AI is the most transformative technology we've seen since the Internet, and it's enabling companies to innovate much faster than ever before (in existing market segments and altogether new ones)," Amazon's Beth Galetti wrote. "We're convinced that we need to be organized more leanly, with fewer layers and more ownership, to move as quickly as possible for our customers and business."

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Amazon said it will continue to hire in "key strategic areas" in 2026 while also "finding additional places we can remove layers, increase ownership, and realize efficiency gains."

The company recently boasted about its annual holiday-hiring increase, stating its plans to fill approximately 250,000 positions. However, in its communications, Amazon has avoided directly revealing its plans relating to automation. It did, however, deny recent claims that it has directed employees to avoid using terms such as "automation" and "AI" in reference to robotics.

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