Salesforce Announces Plans to Hire 1,000 Recent Graduates Amid Industry-Wide Job Cuts

Tech Giants Clash on AI's Impact on Entry-Level Jobs

Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff has announced that his company will be hiring 1,000 new graduates and interns, a move that comes at a time when artificial intelligence (AI) has challenged the economics of software firms and software-as-a-service (SaaS) companies like Salesforce across the globe. In a social media post on X on 25 April, Benioff highlighted the importance of young talent in building innovative technologies such as Agentforce and Headless360.

This move is a response to recent comments made by David Sacks, a Trump administration AI expert, who pointed out that the hiring of new college graduates is up 5.6% over last year. According to a recent report by The Wall Street Journal, youth unemployment for degreed 20-24-year-olds has fallen to 5.3% from 8.9%. This contradicts predictions made by some experts that AI would eliminate 50% of entry-level white-collar jobs within the next five years.

Read also: Treasury Yields Experience Largest Increase in Two Weeks Following Release of Labor Market Data

Despite Benioff's efforts to counter the narrative that AI is killing entry-level jobs, Big Tech companies in the US have announced sweeping layoffs in recent weeks. Meta has announced plans to cut over 8,000 job roles and leave 6,000 roles unfilled as it ramps up spending on AI. Microsoft is offering voluntary buyouts to about 8,750 employees in the United States, covering nearly 7% of its domestic workforce. Snap, the parent company of popular messaging service Snapchat, has announced plans to slash up to 16% of its global workforce. Oracle has initiated a process to cut nearly 30,000 positions, roughly 18% of its global workforce, and the company's layoffs have also affected India, where 12,000 employees were terminated. Block, a fintech company co-founded by Jack Dorsey, has announced layoffs for over 4,000 employees, about 40% of its workforce.

According to layoffs.fyi, an independent, real-time tracker of job losses in the tech and startup sectors across the world, more than 81,200 employees have been laid off by 97 tech firms so far in 2026. AI-related restructuring is a major catalyst driving these layoffs, as tech firms increasingly allocate funds to automation and efficiency, leading to workforce trimming.