Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

2026 tech layoffs reach 45,000 in March

technode.global

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

151–160 of 164 posts

Re: 2026 tech layoffs reach 45,000 in March

#151

Post by derwiki »

thr0w wrote: post #142
thway15269037 wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's baffling that with current iteration of hype mania all of the lessons about metrics were thrown out of the window. Goodhart's law anyone? All of a sudden all of the terrible, horrifying methods of measuring lines of code, commits, tasks etc. resurfaced, like world was hit with an amnesia meteor.

You sweet, innocent child. Managers understand that metrics are meaningless. The idea is to have something to point at to scare engineers into jumping higher.

Exactly. All these internal “AI Leaderboards” are a proxy for “who is working.”

Re: 2026 tech layoffs reach 45,000 in March

#152

Post by Retric »

jjmarr wrote: post #143
Retric wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Again you assume a year delay on a workers full salary before the company gets compensated. Cash flow rarely works like that. Uber driver does what 2 weeks of work before getting paid, they also front the cost of their car and gas etc. Meanwhile users are paying as soon as the ride occurs, so uber doesn’t need an account with a full years salary for every driver somewhere at the start of the year. Get paid before the…

Do you see the broader point I'm making, which is that non-zero interest rates means delivering value isn't enough anymore?

+/- 0.1% over a year isn’t meaningful here. I understand that you’re unwilling to reconsider your beliefs when they are based on faulty math and thus don’t reflect the underlying reality here.

A plumber, doctor, teacher, cook, etc does work before getting paid and the company rarely needs to wait 365 days for someone to pay them for that work. This means your idea is inherently flawed, there’s no broader point when you’re making a mistake.

Further future revenue is generally inflation adjusted. If you borrow 1B to build a power plant you sell electricity at future prices not what electricity was worth when you started building. When the reverse happens say at collages when they get paid months before professors get paid, the school isn’t increasing salaries every month to keep up with inflation.

Re: 2026 tech layoffs reach 45,000 in March

#153

Post by Forgeties79 »

joe_mamba wrote: post #14
PlanksVariable wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And for how many more years are we going to be calling this a post-Covid market correction?

It takes time to correct 10 years of ZIRP, plus COVID overhiring that doubled the headcount of those 10 years in just 2-3. The jig was up when social media like Reddit and tiktok during the pandemic was full of posts with big tech workers gloating about getting hired for six figure salaries to sleep in and play video games at home while putting in 2 hours of work a week, obvious to anyone with two neurons to rub toge…

> Further reinforced with Elon firing 80% of Twitter and the website didn't stop working, reminding big tech CEOs that they can also start looking into trimming the overhiring fat in their back yard, with no operational loss.

I would argue Twitter is in a worse state operationally, but either way it’s moot because one simply has to look at the company’s valuation since Musk took over to see things aren’t going well. Unless the goal is a very loud megaphone for conservative influencers and talking points, in which case things are going great.

Re: 2026 tech layoffs reach 45,000 in March

#154

Post by bwestergard »

phyzix5761 wrote: post #66
bwestergard wrote: post #4

The framing of this makes it seem like this is a sharp change in trend, but this long-running layoff tracker shows no evidence of this. 2020 and 2023 both had serious layoff spikes, but the 2023 spike trailed off to an asymptote that we're still hovering around. https://layoffs.fyi/

This is missing a lot of data. Companies that I know for a fact are doing mass tech layoffs are not listed here.

Then please do add your data through the submission form.

I'm sure some underreporting occurs, but what evidence is there that underreporting is worse this year than last year or the year before?

Re: 2026 tech layoffs reach 45,000 in March

#155

Post by joe_mamba »

Forgeties79 wrote: post #153
joe_mamba wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It takes time to correct 10 years of ZIRP, plus COVID overhiring that doubled the headcount of those 10 years in just 2-3. The jig was up when social media like Reddit and tiktok during the pandemic was full of posts with big tech workers gloating about getting hired for six figure salaries to sleep in and play video games at home while putting in 2 hours of work a week, obvious to anyone with two neurons to rub toge…

> Further reinforced with Elon firing 80% of Twitter and the website didn't stop working, reminding big tech CEOs that they can also start looking into trimming the overhiring fat in their back yard, with no operational loss. I would argue Twitter is in a worse state operationally, but either way it’s moot because one simply has to look at the company’s valuation since Musk took over to see things aren’t going well.…

>I would argue Twitter is in a worse state operationally

Is it because they lack coding manpower, or because Elon chased away all advertisers? Correlation != causation.

Bear in mind I was talking about functionality of the product, not corporate operation/valuation.

>Unless the goal is a very loud megaphone for conservative influencers and talking points, in which case things are going great.

Funny, I never heard the left complain about Twitter being a woke/democrat megaphone during the Jack Dorsey era. Or complain about the social media censorship during the Biden administration. Where were they back then?

They don't hate the propaganda megaphone, they hate not being the ones in charge of it.

Re: 2026 tech layoffs reach 45,000 in March

#156

Post by Forgeties79 »

joe_mamba wrote: post #155
Forgeties79 wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Further reinforced with Elon firing 80% of Twitter and the website didn't stop working, reminding big tech CEOs that they can also start looking into trimming the overhiring fat in their back yard, with no operational loss. I would argue Twitter is in a worse state operationally, but either way it’s moot because one simply has to look at the company’s valuation since Musk took over to see things aren’t going well.…

>I would argue Twitter is in a worse state operationally Is it because they lack coding manpower, or because Elon chased away all advertisers? Correlation != causation. Bear in mind I was talking about functionality of the product, not corporate operation/valuation. >Unless the goal is a very loud megaphone for conservative influencers and talking points, in which case things are going great. Funny, I never heard the…

>Is it because they lack coding manpower, or because Elon chased away all advertisers? Correlation != causation.

Didn’t say that.

> Bear in mind I was talking about functionality of the product, not corporate operation/valuation.

Didn’t say otherwise. In fact I made it a point to separate out the discussion of how it is functioning operationally from its valuation.

> Funny, I never heard the left complain about Twitter being a woke/democrat megaphone during the Jack Dorsey era.

And the right isn’t complaining about the current state. You also don’t know what I said about Twitter back then. I’m not accountable for whatever general idea you have concocted “the left.”

I am simply saying that it clearly is a megaphone for the right now. If you think it is even somewhat neutral and balanced now feel free to say so, but I would be surprised to hear that.

Re: 2026 tech layoffs reach 45,000 in March

#157

Post by joe_mamba »

Forgeties79 wrote: post #156
joe_mamba wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I would argue Twitter is in a worse state operationally Is it because they lack coding manpower, or because Elon chased away all advertisers? Correlation != causation. Bear in mind I was talking about functionality of the product, not corporate operation/valuation. >Unless the goal is a very loud megaphone for conservative influencers and talking points, in which case things are going great. Funny, I never heard the…

>Is it because they lack coding manpower, or because Elon chased away all advertisers? Correlation != causation. Didn’t say that. > Bear in mind I was talking about functionality of the product, not corporate operation/valuation. Didn’t say otherwise. In fact I made it a point to separate out the discussion of how it is functioning operationally from its valuation. > Funny, I never heard the left complain about Twitt…

Sorry I didn't mean to paint you as "the left", I was speaking in general sense.

And that's why I said "They don't hate the propaganda megaphone, they hate not being the ones in charge of it.", meaning I don't think it's a partisan issue, and both sides are equally guilty.

Re: 2026 tech layoffs reach 45,000 in March

#158

Post by Forgeties79 »

joe_mamba wrote: post #157
Forgeties79 wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Is it because they lack coding manpower, or because Elon chased away all advertisers? Correlation != causation. Didn’t say that. > Bear in mind I was talking about functionality of the product, not corporate operation/valuation. Didn’t say otherwise. In fact I made it a point to separate out the discussion of how it is functioning operationally from its valuation. > Funny, I never heard the left complain about Twitt…

Sorry I didn't mean to paint you as "the left", I was speaking in general sense. And that's why I said "They don't hate the propaganda megaphone, they hate not being the ones in charge of it." , meaning I don't think it's a partisan issue, and both sides are equally guilty.

Maybe so but Musk’s whole promise was more neutrality and openness, which he has handedly failed to bring about. Twitter censors worse and more explicitly than ever. And don’t even get me started on Grok/Grokopedia. Like Trump it’s “accurate” if it reflects his worldview - same reason he puts his thumb on the scale with Twitter.

I am progressive. I understand Twitter leaned left. But it leans way further right now as exerted from the top than it did the other direction.

Re: 2026 tech layoffs reach 45,000 in March

#159

Post by judahmeek »

PostOnce wrote: post #136
mancerayder wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your contracting business is done because of AI competition, because money is drying, or because you're finding permanent alternatives due to being sick of it? There's more than one way to interpret your message, and I'm curious.

Sick to death of it. The work is still there. I can only work so many hours in a day on a contract, but with a product, I can work 3 hours and sell it 200 times, or license it and make money forever. My customers have said to me point blank "I hate SaaS" and paid me anyway. They've said everything is "so easy with GPT and all now", and paid me anyway. I think I have a chance. Maybe I'll be proven wrong and my AI-usin…

I'd like to learn more about your current contracting process.

It sounds like you could use an apprentice to help handle things as a backup plan.

Re: 2026 tech layoffs reach 45,000 in March

#160

Post by menaerus »

js8 wrote: post #82
bayarearefugee wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also, whether Covid is to blame or not, all these layoffs (not just the Meta one) contradict some of the most common rationalizations I've seen for how AI won't destroy the labor market but rather expand it. If there really is all this latent untapped need to drive a Jevron's effect software explosion that will keep developers employable, why would so many profitable companies be laying off so many workers into the t…

I have an explanation (or rationalization, if you wish) for this. The AI caused the developer productivity to increase (similar to other two big SW engineering productivity jumps - compilers and open source), which gives them more leverage over employers (capital). Things that you needed a small team to build (and thus more capital) you can now do in a single person. In the long run, this will mean more software bein…

> as price of SW goes down demand increases

I see this view very often being pulled into the debate but demand is not only driven through a (low) cost. Demand obviously cannot grow infinitely so the actual question IMO is when and how do we reach the market saturation point.

First hypothesis is that ~all SWEs will remain employed (demand will proportionally rise with the lower cost of development).

Second hypothesis is some % of SWEs will loose their jobs - over-subscription of SWE roles (lower cost of development will drive the demand but not such that the market will be able to keep all those ~30M SWEs employed).

Third hypothesis is that we will see number of SWEs growing beyond ~30M - under-subscription of SWE roles (demand will be so high and development cost so low that we will enter the era of hyperinflation in software production).

At this point, I am inclined to believe that the second hypothesis is the most likely one.

Post reply on HN