AI Fuels Tech Layoffs but Boosts Other Sectors’ Salaries by $18K

The Beyond the Buzz study by Lightcast explored AI’s impact on the labor market, highlighting the most affected roles, in-demand AI skills, and adoption trends across industries.

The study found that the tech industry – the original epicenter of AI innovation – is now facing the greatest disruption, with many workers being displaced by the very tools they helped create. Last year, over 150,000 tech workers across 551 companies were laid off, with major cuts coming from giants like Tesla, Google, and Microsoft.

AI is expanding beyond tech and driving salary increases across other industries. More than half of the job postings requesting AI skills in 2024 came from outside the technology industry. In contrast, job postings for AI skills in tech roles have dropped from 61% in 2019 to just 49% in 2024.

Lightcast found 80,000 job postings mentioning Generative AI skills in 2024 – an 800% increase compared to the pre-ChatGPT era. Listings requiring AI skills advertised 28% higher salaries – roughly $18,000 more per annual salary – than those that didn’t require AI literacy.

Postings that mentioned at least two AI skills saw salary gains of up to 43%. These numbers show that AI skills carry a premium across many career areas. Yet the highest AI-driven income growth isn’t in tech. The top three fields are Customer and Client Support, Sales, and Manufacturing and Production.

The most in-demand AI skills vary by industry. Autonomous driving is prioritized in Transportation, while robotics is key in Maintenance, and machine learning is a top skill in IT and Research roles.

That said, AI expertise isn’t everything employers are after. In fact, only two of the top ten most sought-after skills across industries are AI-specific. Human skills continue to dominate even in highly technical areas.

AI adoption remains strongest in tech sectors, but fields like marketing, design, education, and HR are rapidly catching up. These industries are already seeing measurable benefits from the AI-driven tools they’re implementing. For example, a recent study by ActiveCampaign found that marketers who use AI save 13 hours per week on average.

“The gap between early adopters and the reluctant field widens each quarter,” Lightcast warns. The company urges businesses to invest in AI training for their existing workforce rather than rushing to hire “perfect AI-competent employees.”