New research from the makers of Claude, Anthropic, finds the workers aged 22 to 25 are experiencing a slowdown in hiring. But it has an excuse that will help it sleep better at night.
Anthropic recently published new research that looks at the impacts of AI on the US workforce in terms of its collective “exposure” to the new technology. It covers a range of topics, but notes that the signal of fewer young people being hired in “exposed” industries and roles is “barely statistically significant”.
Whatever you want to tell yourself, Anthropic.
The research lands at a moment in time when massive global companies as well as locals including WiseTech, Telstra, Optus and the Commonwealth Bank are all cutting thousands of jobs in the name of AI efficiencies.
The research posits that workers aged 22 to 25 entering the labour market in occupations most exposed to AI are being hired at a measurably slower rate than their peers in less “exposed” roles. It is, the report’s authors note, the only group across the entire US labour market in which any AI-related hiring impact can yet be detected. The averaged estimate in the post-ChatGPT era is a 14 per cent drop in the job-finding rate in exposed occupations compared with 2022, with (reportedly) no equivalent decrease for workers older than 25.
The authors are careful to note that several alternative explanations exist for this slowdown. Young workers may be staying in their existing jobs, taking jobs in different occupations, or returning to study rather than entering the labour force.
While Anthropic’s own data shows no broad-based AI displacement, the corporate behaviour pointing in a different direction. It’s one that’s pretty hard to ignore.
Australian AI layoffs tell a different story
In February 2026, WiseTech Global announced it would cut roughly 2000 jobs over a two-year restructure, with the company explicitly framing the change as a “deep AI transformation” leading to a “leaner, more efficient AI-led organisation.” Teams in product, development and customer service would see headcount reduced by up to 50 per cent.
The Commonwealth Bank attempted to make 45 call centre roles redundant in July 2025 on the grounds that its voice bot had reduced call volumes by 2,000 a week. The bank reversed the decision a month later, after the Finance Sector Union challenged the claim and CBA acknowledged the volumes had not actually fallen — a rare admission that the AI-displacement case had been overstated.
Telstra cut more than 1000 jobs in the second half of 2025 and has flagged hundreds more in 2026, with a 200-job tranche from its Accenture joint venture partly offshored to India. Optus this year proposed cutting between 200 and 300 jobs as part of an “organisation-wide transformation” that includes the deployment of generative AI in customer-facing roles.
The companies have been careful with their language. Telstra has publicly stated the cuts are “not a result” of its AI adoption. Optus’s CEO has said AI will “never replace humans where it matters most.” But the timing of these decisions, against a backdrop of accelerating AI deployment, is what has reshaped the conversation in Australian workplaces. And it’s what the ACTU was responding to when it convened its summit with Microsoft Australia last month.
The jobs most exposed to AI, and how many Australians do them
The report’s exposure rankings were derived from US occupational data, but the categories map directly to our local workforce.
The ten occupations Anthropic identified as most exposed to AI are:
- Computer programmers
- Customer service representatives
- Data entry keyers
- Medical record specialists
- Market research analysts and marketing specialists
- Sales representatives
- Financial and investment analysts
- Software quality assurance analysts and testers
- Information security analysts
- Computer user support specialists
That’s a hefty slice of Australia’s workforce right there. According the ABS Labour Force Survey, more than 167,000 Australians work as Software and Applications Programmers alone. The 2021 Census, meanwhile, identified ‘General Clerks’ (read: customer service reps) as the third most common occupation in the country, with 244,849 workers, alongside large workforces in adjacent administrative and customer service roles.
Sales Assistants, with 514,084 workers, was the single largest occupation in Australia at the last Census, though only a portion of that work is directly exposed in the way Anthropic’s framework defines it.
Customer service and contact centre work (the jobs that CBA, Telstra and Optus are disrupting) employs tens of thousands of Australians directly, with the major banks and telcos historically among the largest employers in the segment.
Marketing and market research roles in Australia number in the six figures and have been one of the fastest-growing professional categories of the past decade, with Jobs and Skills Australia projecting Advertising and Marketing Professionals to reach 115,900 by May 2030.
Thankfully, the framework Anthropic has built is designed to be revisited as new data arrives. We’ll see if it matches the real-world narrative the next time it rolls around.
