Amazon has cut 30,000 corporate employees since October 2025, the largest workforce reduction in the company’s 31-year history. The latest cuts began Jan. 26 and will continue through May.

The layoffs have sparked a predictable narrative: AI is finally replacing workers at scale. The original thesis framing Amazon’s cuts as proof that companies can “thrive by replacing expensive management layers with high-margin code” sounds compelling.

There’s one problem. CEO Andy Jassy says that’s not what’s happening.

During Amazon’s Q3 2025 earnings call on Oct. 30, 2025, Jassy addressed the layoffs directly. His explanation was unambiguous.

“The announcement that we made a few days ago was not really financially driven, and it’s not even really AI-driven, not right now at least,” Jassy told analysts. “It’s culture.”

Jassy attributed the cuts to pandemic-era overhiring. Amazon’s corporate workforce tripled between 2017 and 2022, growing from roughly 117,000 to 350,000. As the company expanded, it accumulated management layers that slowed decision-making.

“If you grow as fast as we did for several years, the size of businesses, the number of people, the number of locations, the types of businesses you’re in, you end up with a lot more people than what you had before, and you end up with a lot more layers,” Jassy said. “Sometimes without realizing it, you can weaken the ownership of the people that you have who are doing the actual work.”

Beth Galetti, Amazon’s Senior VP of People Experience and Technology, confirmed the January layoffs with similar framing. Her statement mentioned “reducing layers, increasing ownership, and removing bureaucracy.” AI was not mentioned once.

Amazon’s workforce trajectory tells a clearer story than any AI narrative.

The company grew from 798,000 employees in 2019 to 1.6 million by 2022. This hiring binge was driven by pandemic e-commerce demand, not strategic planning. When consumer behavior normalized, Amazon found itself with significant redundancy.

The current cuts follow 27,000 layoffs between 2022 and 2023. Combined with the 30,000 cuts since October 2025, Amazon has eliminated roughly 57,000 corporate positions under Jassy’s leadership.

Forbes Daily: Join over 1 million Forbes Daily subscribers and get our best stories, exclusive reporting........

© Forbes