Amazon cuts 30,000 jobs as firms tighten AI usage and spending

Amazon announced the termination of roughly 30,000 corporate positions while continuing to pour billions into AI infrastructure. Employees at a Seattle City Council hearing warned that the layoffs clash with the company’s push to build large AI data centres, and software engineer Patrick Schloesser said, “The leaders at my company have laid off 30,000 corporate employees in the last eight months.” The company also shut down an internal AI token leaderboard after executives warned staff not to use AI “just for the sake of using AI.”

Other major U.S. firms are scaling back AI experiments. Walmart capped employee use of its internal AI assistant, and Uber limited monthly spending on AI coding tools to $1,500 per tool after blowing through its budget. Google reported a seven‑fold rise in monthly AI token consumption, reaching 3.2 quadrillion tokens. Industry observers note that while AI promises productivity gains, companies are now grappling with rising costs, waste, and the need for clearer value metrics.