Goldman Sachs finds AI layoffs leaving long-lasting scars on workers

Workers displaced from AI-exposed jobs since 2025 are struggling to get rehired, and Goldman says the pattern looks familiar Goldman Sachs has spent years studying what happens to Americans who lose their jobs to technology. Its latest finding: the first wave of workers pushed out of AI-exposed roles is following the same rough path. That path does not end well, at least not quickly. Goldman economist Pierfrancesco Mei described the damage from earlier tech-driven layoffs as “long-lasting,” and he now sees comparable effects showing up among people displaced by AI. A slower road back to work Mei’s April 2026 note looked at workers who lost jobs in AI-exposed occupations since 2025. He compared them with other displaced workers who were let go for different reasons. The AI-exposed group took about a month longer to land a new position. The bigger number is the one-year mark. Workers displaced from AI-exposed jobs were roughly 10 percentage points more likely to still be out of work a full year after their layoff. Mei wrote that these effects are “comparable in magnitude” to what Goldman measured during previous rounds of technological change. The bank’s research draws on four decade...