Free Republic

Almost every week the world takes another step in the direction of artificial general intelligence. The most powerful ai models can do an astonishing array of tasks from writing detailed reports to creating video on demand. Hallucinations are becoming less of a problem. Small wonder, then, that so many people worry they will soon be surplus to requirements. Earlier this year global Google searches for “ai unemployment” hit an all-time high. In cities such as London and San Francisco, “How long do you reckon you have left in your job?” is a common topic of conversation. But is Chatgpt actually...

Hundreds of Starbucks baristas across the country have been left without jobs, following the coffeehouse’s recently announced decision to close 1% of its stores — roughly 400, in total — in North America this month. The move to shutter these locations, according to Starbucks CEO Brian Niccol, is part of a larger $1 billion restructuring plan. The coffee chain will also be laying off 900 corporate employees as a result. “Each year, we open and close coffeehouses for a variety of reasons, from financial performance to lease expirations. This is a more significant action that we understand will impact partners...

Ahead of a possible government shutdown on October 1st, the White House Office of Management and Budget has instructed federal agencies to prepare for mass layoffs. Thousands of federal employees — specifically in agencies that lack funding and don’t align with President Trump’s goals — could permanently lose their jobs if the shutdown happens. ...details: BREAKING: TRUMP ADMIN THREATENS MASS FEDERAL LAYOFFS IN SHUTDOWN OMB Director Russ Vought ordered agencies to prepare Reduction in Force (RIF) notices for “thousands” of federal employees if government shuts down October 1. The memo directs layoffs for any programs that: lack funding, aren’t covered...

Rolling Stone was hit with a series of high-profile layoffs this week, which we can only hope means the magazine will get what it deserves: a long, slow, painful, and humiliating death. “An unknown number of Rolling Stone staff, including some of the storied publication’s most prominent voices, were laid off on Monday,” reports the far-left Wrap. Tee hee. Those s******ed include “executive digital director Lisa Tozzi, chief television critic Alan Sepinwall and copy chief Steven Pearl.” Learn to coalmine. …

Bosses today aren’t just unapologetic about staff cuts. Many are touting shrinking head counts as accomplishments in the AI era.Big companies are getting smaller—and their CEOs want everyone to know it. The careful, coded corporate language executives once used in describing staff cuts is giving way to blunt boasts about ever-shrinking workforces. Gone are the days when trimming head count signaled retrenchment or trouble. Bosses are showing off to Wall Street that they are embracing artificial intelligence and serious about becoming lean. After all, it is no easy feat to cut head count for 20 consecutive quarters, an accomplishment...

The number of Americans filing new applications for jobless benefits fell to a three-month low last week, pointing to stable labor market conditions, though sluggish hiring is making it harder for many laid-off workers to land new opportunities. The lack of material labor market deterioration likely gives the Federal Reserve cover to keep interest unchanged next week amid signs that President Donald Trump's aggressive tariffs on imports were starting to lift inflation. Trump is pressuring the U.S. central bank to resume its interest rate cuts. "At the moment, the labor market is holding up with financial markets holding their breath,"...

There’s an old saying that goes, something that can’t go on forever won’t. Chicago is now in the early stages of learning that this applies to their public school system. They’re facing a massive budget deficit of $734 million and are on pace to lay off almost 1,500 teachers and staffers. Perhaps Mayor Brandon Johnson should have been more focused on delivering the services that American citizen taxpayers paid for and less on the needs of illegal immigrants and Chicago’s ‘sanctuary city’ status. ... Chicago Public Schools parents and community members sounded off on Monday, three days after the district...

The Supreme Court on Monday allowed President Trump to resume efforts to dismantle the Department of Education in an apparent 6-3 vote along ideological lines, lifting a judge’s order to reinstate employees terminated in mass layoffs. The administration’s victory enables the president to move closer to fulfilling of one of his major campaign promises to oversee the elimination of the the Education Department, which was created in the 1970s. The majority did not explain their reasoning, as is typical in emergency decisions. The court’s three Democratic-appointed justices publicly dissented, calling their colleagues’ ruling “indefensible.” “It hands the Executive the power...

New CEO Lip-Bu Tan is streamlining Intel’s operations and reducing spending in response to a sharp downturn in sales and technological setbacks that rendered Intel an also-ran in an industry it helped invent. Intel had been firing workers all last week but then Friday evening came word the company plans to lay off nearly 2,400 Oregon workers. Intel’s position in the industry has slumped badly. The company’s market value is around $100 billion, about half what it was just 18 months ago. Nevertheless, the company is hugely important to Oregon as one of its largest private employers. Across the U.S.,...

The State Department informed U.S.-based employees on Thursday that it would soon begin laying off nearly 2,000 workers after the recent Supreme Court decision allowing the Trump administration to move forward with mass job cuts as part of its efforts to downsize the federal workforce. The agency's reorganization plan was first unveiled in April by Secretary of State Marco Rubio to eliminate functions and offices the department considered to be redundant. In February, President Donald Trump issued an executive order directing Rubio to revamp the foreign service to ensure that the president's foreign policy is "faithfully" implemented. Employees affected by...

Microsoft says it is laying off about 9,000 workers, its second mass layoff in months and its largest in more than two years. The tech giant began sending out layoff notices Wednesday that hit the company’s Xbox video game business and other divisions. Among those losing their jobs are 830 workers tied to Microsoft’s headquarters in Redmond, Washington, according to a notice sent to state officials Wednesday.

A new report from the head of the IRS’s Taxpayer Advocate Service shows that the agency has lost more than one-quarter of its workforce since President Donald Trump assumed office.The overhaul is consistent with the administration’s effort to slim down the federal government, but it raises questions about the agency’s readiness for the 2026 tax season.According to the June 25 report, the IRS workforce has dropped from 102,113 employees to 75,702 since January—a roughly 26 percent reduction. The majority of those departures came through voluntary exit programs rolled out by the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), a Trump administration initiative...

Entertainment giant Disney is continuing its campaign of employee layoffs with its latest round of cuts hitting its product and technology division. While Disney insists that the P&T division is critical to its future success, the layoffs nonetheless cut an additional two percent of the company’s workforce, The Wrap reported. This latest round of cost cutting is just one of a long series of cuts lasting several years. Indeed, it isn’t even the first round of layoffs this month. Early this month the company pushed out several hundred workers from its marketing for both film and television, television publicity, and...

EXCLUSIVE: Major layoffs are underway Monday the Walt Disney Company, with several hundred employees impacted globally, Deadline has learned. The bulk of them are across divisions of Disney Entertainment, including marketing for both film and television as well as television publicity, casting and development. Also affected are Disney’s corporate financial operations. According to sources, the size of the cuts on the film and TV side of Disney Entertainment is comparable. No teams are being eliminated. The majority of the Disney Entertainment Television staffers are said to be based in Los Angeles. Deadline will continue its coverage as more details about...

CVS says it will close 271 retail locations across the country by the end of the year. The company — the world’s second-largest healthcare provider — announced the move to stockholders late last week as part of an enterprise-wide restructuring plan. The goal, CVS says, is to simplify the organization, improve efficiency, and generate more than $500 million in cost savings in 2025. CVS has not yet released which stores will be affected or when closures will take place. The company currently operates around 9,100 stores across the US. Founded in 1963 in Lowell, Massachusetts, CVS is now headquartered in...

Verizon announced the termination of its diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) policies in a Thursday letter sent to FCC Chairman Brandon Carr. The telecommunications company said it recognized that some of its DEI policies were "discriminatory" and vowed to terminate all company roles focused on DEI effective immediately. This comes after the Trump administration launched a probe into the company over such policies in February. Verizon cited Supreme Court rulings, President Donald Trump's executive orders, and federal mandates for its decision to eliminate DEI from the company. The company will no longer maintain workforce diversity goals and said it would...

A Redfin analysis shows that the number of homes for sale in Washington, DC, rose at the fastest pace on record last month. Sweeping layoffs of government workers spearheaded by DOGE boosted the figure. DOGE slashed over 200,000 federal jobs in March alone, one analysis found. Widespread layoffs of federal workers are rippling through the housing market of the nation's capital, with Washington, DC, in April seeing the biggest surge in the number of homes for sale ever recorded, data from Redfin shows. Active listings of homes for sale in Washington, DC, soared 25.1% year-over-year in the four weeks leading...

Shortly after taking office, the Trump administration offered federal employees a deal many couldn’t refuse: resign voluntarily and receive full benefits and paid leave lasting until September.Demonstrators rally outside the U.S. Office of Personnel Management in Washington on Feb. 5, 2025. Nathan Howard/ReutersMore than 75,000 workers eventually accepted the Deferred Resignation Program, or buyout, which came as part of the administration’s broader efforts to shrink the size of the federal bureaucracy. Since the beginning of President Donald Trump’s second term, the government has already laid off hundreds of thousands of federal employees and contractors.As the federal government concludes a second...

From ancient Rome to modern America, the impulse to wall off economies in times of crisis has proven consistently disastrous. Whether through tariff wars, currency debasement, or autarkic fantasies, economic nationalism has repeatedly triggered collapse -- not recovery Politicising structural economic fundamentals always leads to chaos, as history tells us. In the early 1930s, American President Herbert Hoover faced an agonising decision. The global economy, already reeling from the crash of 1929 and the calamity of the Great Depression, presented Hoover with mounting demands from his supporters for protectionism as a means of shielding the American economy from further harm....

The layoffs come as the Trump administration continues to shrink the size of the federal workforce through the Department of Government EfficiencyThe Internal Revenue Service (IRS) will slash its workforce by at least 25% beginning Friday with layoffs as the Trump administration continues to shrink the size of the federal government. In addition to the layoffs, the agency said in a letter to employees that it is eliminating its Office of Civil Rights and Compliance, which is responsible for protecting taxpayers from discrimination, audits and investigations. The remaining employees in the division will be transferred to other departments. "In a...