AI-related job loss fears grow each time another company announces a round of layoffs. Through May of 2026, companies announced that close to 90,000 job cuts were tied to AI, and, by some accounts, up to 15% of U.S. jobs are projected to be eliminated by AI over the next five years. Promises from the tech industry that AI will also create new jobs does little to ease fears, especially for the generation wondering if anyone will be hiring when they graduate.

A recent report from Ramp and Revelio Labs, which track enterprise AI spend and workforce records from nearly 22,000 companies, respectively, complicates that gloomy narrative.

The report found that companies spending heavily on AI are growing headcount faster, even in the entry-level roles that many fear are doomed. According to the report, “high-intensity adopters” — firms that spend on average $30 per employee per month on AI in the first three months — saw headcount increase 10.2%.

Headcount also rose across functions, including engineering, sales, administration, customer service, finance, marketing, and scientist roles. The strongest job growth among high-intensity adopters was in the information sector, which includes software, internet, media, and tech-adjacent firms.

Despite these positive signals, the data isn’t as rosy as it seems. It skews heavily towards tech-forward, knowledge-work firms — ones that might have VC-backing and are growing fast anyway, making it difficult to say whether AI is contributing to the hiring or just showing up at companies that are expanding anyway.

“This paper does not show that AI universally creates jobs,” the paper’s authors admit, “but it does counter claims that AI will lead to broad job losses.”