Skepticism that ‘firing because of AI’ is a whitewashing tactic

Last week, Amazon announced it was laying off 16,000 office workers, in addition to the 14,000 people laid off last fall. On the blog, the company said “AI and automated agents change the way we work” and did not rule out the possibility of continuing to reduce the total number of employees in the office in the coming years.

Last month, Pinterest also announced a 15% reduction in its workforce, partly due to “reallocation of resources to AI-focused positions”. At the end of November 2025, HP CEO Enrique Lores also announced plans to adjust 6,000 positions due to “seeing significant opportunities when integrating AI into the company’s operations”.

In some other fields, the trend is similar, according to LATimes. In September 2025, German airline group Deutsche Lufthansa AG cut 4,000 administrative staff due to “increasing use of AI”. A few weeks later, Dutch bank ING Group NV said nearly 1,000 positions at “are threatened by digitalization, AI and changing customer needs”.

As of the end of last year, statistics from human resources consulting firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas showed that AI was the cause of 48,414 cases of job cuts in the US, with 31,039 cases in October alone. Investors also reacted positively to this move, as the company’s shares often increase after cuts.

According to research firm Forrester, businesses in the past gave many reasons for firing employees, such as not meeting financial goals, overhiring, tariff issues, or suddenly losing a large customer. However, recent statistics show that AI is becoming a “trendy and safe” reason to blame.

“Many companies announce AI-related layoffs, but they do not have AI applications that are mature enough, proven and ready to replace the fired positions,” Forrester commented when releasing the 2025-2030 AI Job Replacement Trend Forecast. “This is a sign of ‘AI whitewashing’, which is a plan to cut staff because of the financial benefits attributed to AI deployment.”

The term “AI washing” has been widely used in recent months to refer to companies using artificial intelligence as “cannon fodder” when laying off employees, while the reality can be more complicated such as the company is facing financial difficulties, or there is a surplus of labor due to recruitment during Covid-19.

In the report, Forrester points out that AI “has a real-world impact but is modest”. This technology could cause 6% of jobs lost in the US, equivalent to 10.4 million positions. However, widespread replacement is unlikely.

“Companies are saying they will apply AI to replace jobs in positions that have just been laid off. In reality, that has not happened on a large scale and we have reason to be skeptical,” said Professor Peter Cappelli at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. New York Times.

Molly Kinder, a researcher at the Brookings Institute specializing in AI, estimates that this type of proactive layoff allows executives to signal to the market that they are pioneering the application of AI and have found ways to save costs. This is a much more “friendly” message to investors than the real reason “the business is having difficulty”.

A study conducted by Molly Kinder and colleagues for the Yale Department of Budget Research published in October 2025 found that AI does not significantly change the overall job market. The results show that indicators for exposure, automation and outsourcing “have not shown any signs of being related to changes in employment or unemployment”.

According to employment tracking platform Layoffs.fyi, technology companies have cut more than 700,000 employees globally since 2022 – when ChatGPT was launched. However, much of that is an adjustment due to over-hiring during the pandemic.

TechCrunch assessment, citing AI when firing may be unpopular with the public, but is less controversial than other reasons. In today’s sensitive context, attributing it to AI “is not too risky, even if the real culprit may be something else”.