## Weekly Workforce Update: How AI Changed Work for Employees

The final week of 2025 brought clarity to a year of workplace uncertainty driven by artificial intelligence. Across the world, workers faced a jobs market that looked completely different than it did just twelve months earlier. The impact came in waves: some workers lost their jobs to automation, others discovered new career opportunities, and many simply lived in fear of what might happen next.

## Young People Face the Biggest Job Crisis

College graduates and young workers aged 22 to 25 experienced the most severe job shortage related to AI in 2025. Job postings that would normally go to recent college graduates fell by 13 percent since ChatGPT became popular in late 2022. At technology companies, the percentage of young workers aged 21 to 25 was cut in half between early 2023 and mid-2025, dropping from 15 percent to just 6.8 percent of the workforce. Isabella Clemmens, a recent graduate, explained the frustration: 'My dream job might exist, but I'm one of 400 people applying for it.' Many young people began switching careers entirely, with more considering skilled trades like plumbing and electrical work instead of traditional office jobs.

## Workers Report Stress and Burnout

Even employees who kept their jobs struggled emotionally throughout 2025. Companies delayed hiring new staff because they weren't sure how AI would change their workforce, leaving existing workers overwhelmed. Psychologists and workplace experts described this phenomenon as 'quiet cracking' — a persistent feeling of unhappiness where workers felt disengaged and overwhelmed but stayed at their jobs because they feared something worse. A Harvard Business Review survey found that workers carried heavier mental loads and experienced lower psychological safety as AI adoption accelerated faster than many organizations could handle. The stress came from pressure to learn new skills, uncertainty about job security, and the fear that automation could replace them at any moment.

## The Layoff Wave Continues

Over 55,000 people lost jobs related to AI in 2025, with December seeing significant cuts announced. Companies from Meta to Google to smaller cybersecurity firms all cut staff, citing the need to become more efficient with AI. A new business philosophy called 'efficiency' became the driving force behind these decisions, where leaders like Meta's Mark Zuckerberg and Amazon's Andy Jassy flattened their organizational structures and removed management layers. The United States federal government also participated, with approximately 265,000 government employees leaving their jobs due to efficiency drives. For workers, these announcements meant constant anxiety about whether their position would be next.

## Some Bright Spots Emerged

Despite the challenges, research revealed surprising good news: jobs most exposed to AI were actually growing, not shrinking. According to investment company Vanguard, approximately 100 occupations that experts thought would be automated — including office clerks, HR assistants, and data scientists — experienced stronger job growth than other fields. These workers also received larger raises, with wage growth reaching 3.8 percent compared to only 0.7 percent for workers in non-AI fields. This suggested that instead of replacing workers, AI was helping them do more valuable work. For experienced AI researchers and specialists who could train or evaluate AI systems, the year brought remarkable financial opportunities, with top talent becoming millionaires.

## Workers Fight Back

Not all employees accepted the AI transformation quietly. Some workers questioned whether AI actually improved productivity or simply created new problems, and they raised concerns about AI's limitations, mistakes, and environmental impact. They worried that becoming too dependent on AI systems was risky. Their skepticism turned out to be valuable: companies that listened to these concerns discovered real weaknesses in their AI strategies that might have caused bigger problems later.

## Looking Ahead

As 2025 ended, the picture for workers remained complicated and uncertain. The year had not caused a complete jobs apocalypse as some feared, but it had certainly reshaped which types of work existed and who could find employment. Young people needed to work harder to stand out, experienced workers felt pressure to constantly learn new skills, and managers struggled to lead teams through rapid change. Yet opportunities existed for those who could adapt, particularly in specialized AI roles and in jobs that required human skills that machines couldn't replicate. The labor market would continue changing in 2026, and workers worldwide would need to stay flexible and keep learning to navigate whatever came next.