US tech sheds 140,000 jobs amid big AI investments
Big tech is making headlines for all the wrong reasons this year. Nearly 140,000 US tech workers have lost their jobs in 2026. That's over one-third of all layoffs nationwide.
Companies like Amazon, Oracle, Meta, and Microsoft alone have let go of about 50,000 people (roughly 6% of their staff).
Most of these cuts follow the pandemic hiring boom and are part of a shift toward saving costs and betting big on AI.
Tech giants invest $725B, Oracle $70B
While thousands lose jobs, tech giants are pouring record amounts into AI: projected to invest around $725 billion this year from Amazon, Alphabet, Meta, and Microsoft largely for data centers supporting AI services.
Oracle is planning to spend about $70 billion to boost cloud services for customers including OpenAI.
The message: companies are trimming teams but doubling down on artificial intelligence to drive future growth.