Bill Gates: “We’ll Decide How Many Humans We Need” After AI

Bill Gates’s prediction that society will “decide how many humans we need” in the AI era is playing out rapidly, with this summer marking the most disruptive phase yet. The US tech sector has now exceeded 130,000 layoffs in 2025, with Microsoft, Intel, and other giants accelerating job cuts in July to shift resources to AI infrastructure, engineering, and research. Notably, Microsoft alone has eliminated over 9,000 positions this month as it pivots toward AI and cloud growth. Intel and Scale AI have followed suit with large-scale reductions, citing the need to streamline operations and invest in generative AI.

Despite these losses, the job market is not shrinking—it’s transforming. More than 80,000 current US job postings now specifically require generative AI skills, a massive increase from previous years. These roles are rapidly extending beyond tech, with over half found in fields like marketing, finance, and healthcare. Salaries for AI-skilled positions average 28% (about $18,000) higher than comparable non-AI jobs.

Entry-level and repetitive jobs are disappearing at an unprecedented pace, creating new barriers for recent graduates and low-experience workers. Staying competitive requires adaptation: employers and policymakers emphasize workforce retraining, digital apprenticeships, and cross-sector AI fluency as keys to navigating the new landscape.

Driving this upheaval is the US government’s America’s AI Action Plan, unveiled on July 23. The Plan clears regulatory hurdles, injects funding into AI infrastructure and talent, and positions American companies for global AI leadership. At the same time, it retools compliance and international strategy, pressing businesses to adapt swiftly to new rules and opportunities while focusing on worker retraining and national security.

On the corporate front, Microsoft’s Azure AI continues to surge, reporting the fastest growth among US cloud platforms, securing its dominance with a projected $83.3b in 2025 revenue and strong margins from AI services. Demand for cloud and AI infrastructure is now outpacing the rate at which new capacity can be brought online, emphasizing the scale and speed of the transformation.

Bottom line: The world Gates foresaw—where AI determines the contours of human employment—is here. Disruption is not just widespread; it’s deepening. AI skills have become a ticket to higher salaries, stronger job security, and new career pathways, while the challenge of job displacement and the redefinition of “human” work has become an urgent national—and global—debate.