What happened
SHL's June–July survey found 19.1% of U.S. respondents were replaced by AI and later asked to return; 51% of returnees wanted a substantial pay increase first.
Why it matters
The finding suggests some employers may be rehiring the same people at a higher cost after discovering AI could not fully cover the role, an early sign of limits to automation-driven job cuts.
WHO IT HITSHR and talent acquisition teams at companies that have cut roles citing AI are the most directly affected, as they may face rehiring demands for higher pay and written job-security guarantees. Younger workers aged 18 to 24 appear especially likely to experience the rebound, according to SHL.
Summaries like this, every morning.
SHL's findings sit alongside other evidence that AI-related job cuts are still rising. Outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas counted 121,401 announced job cuts citing AI through October, more than double the 54,836 announced layoff plans for all of 2025. That suggests rebound cases are emerging even as more employers cite AI in workforce reductions.
A separate Robert Half survey from July points to why some reversals happen. Among U.S. hiring managers whose organizations eliminated positions because of AI, 32% later had to reinstate the same or similar roles. 40% of that group said the positions required institutional knowledge or context AI couldn't replace, while 39% cited relationship management and 38% said the roles needed more human oversight and quality control than expected.
Klarna and Ford illustrate the pattern in practice. Klarna CEO Sebastian Siemiatkowski acknowledged the company had gone too far in its reliance on automation, according to Bloomberg, and a spokesperson said human agents were needed for complex, sensitive cases. Ford said AI had contributed to quality improvements but emphasized combining the technology with experienced engineering teams.
Pick your industry and the AI tools you use, and get news related to your work every day.
Free · 30 seconds with Google · unsubscribe anytimeWhat is AIToday? →
Ask AI anything about this article. The AI reads this article, earlier AIToday articles, and Wikipedia, and cites its sources. Q&As are published on this page for other readers too.
After a year in which AI leaders debated slowing development, voters of all stripes had their say and made bui…
The Japan Foundation, asked by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and backed by next fiscal year's budget, will d…
Public First Action and its affiliated super PACs, which get significant funding from Anthropic, shared a memo…
Furukawa Electric will raise output of HVLP4-grade copper foil "F0X-WS箔" in stages at its Nikko, Tochigi and T…
In a simulated queue of 1,000 requests, the median wait for the first token fell from 452 seconds (7.5 minutes…
A Zenn explainer breaks down RAG (Retrieval-Augmented Generation) — which retrieves external data before an LL…
