‘Most people don’t enjoy their jobs’: Perplexity CEO Aravind Srinivas says AI layoffs could lead to a ‘glorious future’

“The reality is most people don’t enjoy their jobs,” Srinivas said. He argued that AI tools are opening “a new possibility, a new opportunity” for people to build small ventures of their own. Even if workers face short-term displacement, he suggested that “that sort of glorious future is what we should look forward to.”

Concerns about AI-driven layoffs are already surfacing. Last month, Jack Dorsey cut roughly 40 per cent of the workforce at Block, stating that “intelligence tools have changed what it means to build and run a company.” The layoffs – affecting around 4,000 employees – are part of more than 101,000 AI-related job losses in the United States since February 2025, according to figures from the nonprofit Alliance for Secure AI.

‘AI washing’ is real, say experts

Still, not everyone is convinced that AI is replacing workers at scale. Analysts at Oxford Economics noted in a recent client update that many companies appear to be “AI washing” – attributing layoffs to technology even when automation is not the primary cause.

Meanwhile, venture capitalist Bill Gurley from Benchmark told CNBC he does not subscribe to overly pessimistic forecasts. He described the current moment as another phase of technological disruption, similar to past cycles in which industries evolved and labour markets eventually stabilised. “I’m not that big of a doomer,” Gurley said, adding that such “apocalyptic” predictions tend to accompany major innovation waves.

Srinivas also framed AI as a break from the repetitive factory-style jobs that became widespread in the early 20th century. Referencing industrialist Henry Ford, he said traditional manufacturing “put people into a box,” whereas AI could make workers more agile and self-reliant. He believes startups and small firms will increasingly rely on automation, reducing the need to raise large amounts of capital or hire big teams in their early stages.

He added that the long-term goal is to enable businesses to function with minimal human intervention. In a similar vein, Sam Altman of OpenAI has predicted that AI could eventually power a billion-dollar company run by a single individual. Srinivas, however, argued that such a milestone has not yet been achieved, noting that no AI-driven venture has added $1 billion in new value to U.S. GDP so far. He suggested the first “one-person unicorn” is more likely to emerge from a small business that has been fully optimised using AI tools.