A man looks inside a Pasadena job center. (Related news organizations)
Joseph Tiner, a laid-off tech worker, has been looking for work for almost a year. It was a depressing crash course in the big changes in Silicon Valley.
The former product instructor from the San Francisco Bay Area has ridden the technology wave throughout his career, jumping briefly with Verizon, Fitbit, and Workday. The 59-year-old has hit a wall since losing his job early last year.
He applied for hundreds of positions and was rejected multiple times, sometimes after multiple reviews.
“It’s been a roller coaster,” he said. “Honestly, it takes a lot of resilience to survive in this job market.”
he is not alone.
Tech companies that hired aggressively during the coronavirus pandemic are cutting tens of thousands of jobs. For workers like Mr. Tiner, there is a general sense that the Silicon Valley shakeout will extend into another year.
read more: Bay Area tech workers thought their jobs were safe. And the “golden handcuffs” came off.
Just last week, Block, the financial technology company that owns payment services Square, Cash App, and Afterpay, said: 4,000 people, half of the company’s workforce, will be laid off.
Many technology companies outside the popular field of artificial intelligence are also cutting jobs. Block blamed AI, saying powerful technology means we won’t need as many people.
“The intelligence tools we are creating and using, when combined with smaller, flatter teams, are enabling new ways of working that fundamentally change what it means to start and run a company,” Block co-founder and Twitter founder Jack Dorsey said in a post on X.
U.S.-based tech employers announced more than 33,000 layoffs from January to February, an increase of 51% from a year earlier, the outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas said Thursday.
read more: Block to cut more than 4,000 jobs as AI disrupts workplaces
Andy Challenger, a workplace expert and the company’s chief revenue officer, said he was previously skeptical about whether companies could replace employees with AI, but is starting to become convinced.
“Artificial intelligence has overtaken the attention of these companies in such a dramatic way,” he said.
The mass layoffs in the tech industry began in 2022 after a surge in hiring during the pandemic, when people were stuck at home and demand for online services increased.
But many of the world’s most powerful technology companies continue to cut back, even as profits increase. They cite a variety of reasons for the layoffs, ranging from strategic shifts and restructuring to pivoting to smaller teams and fewer managers.
Advertisements promoting AI-powered companies are seen in downtown San Francisco, California, on Thursday, October 16, 2025. (Manuel Orbegoso/For the Times)
Technology companies like EBay, Meta, Google, Autodesk, Pinterest, and Salesforce are cutting back on their workforces. Layoffs are also hitting media and entertainment companies, including Los Angeles video game developer Riot Games.
On LinkedIn, laid-off workers who have been out of work for more than two years are looking for help finding work. They have shared stories of financial and emotional struggles, including losing their confidence, homes, and savings while looking for work.
Technology workers who have watched their employers grow over the past decade have noticed a shift in corporate culture. Workers who were previously laid off said it was harder and longer to find new jobs than in previous years.
A long-time Salesforce employee who was recently fired but spoke on condition of anonymity said he was worried that speaking to the media would affect his departure, and that the sales software company used to focus more on supporting its employees. Salesforce promotes this value by emphasizing its “ohana” culture, which means family in Hawaiian.
“I was incredibly grateful every day to get up in the morning and make a positive difference in the world,” the worker said. “I thought the company was passionate about the same thing.”
However, its tone changed in 2023 as Salesforce faced pressure to cut costs and increase profits. A new leader has emerged and the focus has changed.
“The company is trying to shake off the shadow of its former self,” the employee said.
Salesforce said AI allows it to squeeze more profit out of fewer people.
“Today, 30% to 50% of Salesforce’s work is done by AI,” Marc Benioff, the company’s co-founder and CEO, told Bloomberg.
Salesforce did not respond to a request for comment.
Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff said this during an interview on Bloomberg TV at the World Economic Forum in Davos. (Bloomberg/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
Even though technology is changing the way people work, experts and even some AI executives believe that companies are using it as an excuse to cut workers, sometimes referred to as “AI cleaning.”
Enrico Moretti, an economics professor at the University of California, Berkeley, said factors other than AI are also driving layoffs. As companies grow and mature, they can no longer hire as many people as they used to.
“This is a change in their position, a maturation of their products and therefore their technology and their employment needs,” he said.
Entrepreneur Roger Lee, who started Layoffs.fyi, a website that tracks layoffs in 2020, said in an email that technology companies are pouring billions of dollars into AI investments, and job cuts are helping offset those costs.
When Lee started tracking layoffs six years ago, he wanted to raise awareness about technology-related layoffs and help laid-off workers find their next job. He did not expect the layoffs to continue today.
“I believe that six years of continued layoffs have caused many tech workers to reevaluate their perceptions of the ‘safety’ of technology jobs and their relationship with the industry as a whole,” he said in an email.
More than 35,000 jobs have been cut globally in the technology industry so far this year, according to Layoffs.fyi’s latest tally.
Nearly half of that total comes from Amazon alone.
read more: Amazon to lay off 16,000 people and close Amazon Fresh stores
Tinner, an unemployed tech worker, was fired from Workday, a Pleasanton company that provides a platform for businesses, universities and organizations to manage payroll, benefits, finances and other operations.
Workday will cut approximately 1,750 jobs, or 8.5% of its global workforce, in 2025 as it prioritizes investments in artificial intelligence and platform development. And in February, the company announced it planned to cut about 400 jobs, or 2% of its workforce.
Amid a wave of layoffs, Tiner faces intense competition from top tech companies in a job market filled with talent.
As he ponders his next career step, he is also redefining his identity and relationship to work.
He’s even tried pouring beer for fun and considered doing more artwork.
“Maybe what I need to do is just celebrate what I’ve done instead of getting back on this rat race and treadmill and looking for something completely different,” he said.
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This story originally appeared in the Los Angeles Times.
