Heavy AI Spenders Are Adding Workers, Not Cutting Them

Companies spending the most on generative artificial intelligence are growing their workforces faster than companies spending the least.

“A New Look at AI’s Impact on Jobs,” a study by corporate card firm Ramp and workforce analytics firm Revelio Labs, tracked AI vendor spending against workforce records for 21,559 companies in the United States from January 2021 through February 2026.

AI adopters saw headcount rise 10.2% over the two years following adoption, gains the study attributed entirely to high-intensity spenders. Low-intensity adopters saw no statistically significant change in headcount over the same period. Within high-intensity adopters, entry-level headcount grew 12%.

A New Layer of Jobs Is Forming Between AI Models and Customers

The pattern emerging across Google, Box and IBM isn’t primarily displacement, PYMNTS reported June 3. It’s a new organizational layer sitting between foundation models and business operations, staffed by roles that didn’t exist three years ago.

Google is hiring hundreds of forward-deployed engineers to help customers move its AI products from pilot into production, and Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurian said demand for engineers who can drive agent development is growing.

Box CEO Aaron Levie said AI has created 13 new job categories at his company, including model evaluators, a role that exists because models themselves aren’t interchangeable and choosing between them carries real operational weight.

IBM said it will triple entry-level hiring in the U.S. in 2026, even as AI reshapes the tasks traditionally assigned to new graduates. IBM Chief Human Resources Officer Nickle LaMoreaux said the company overhauled entry-level job descriptions for software developers, since work performed by junior hires two to three years ago can now largely be done by AI. Junior developers at IBM now spend less time on routine coding and more time working directly with customers.

Dropbox, meanwhile, is planning to expand its internship and new graduate programs by 25% for the same reason, citing younger workers’ comfort with AI tools.

The Divide Is Between Companies Funding Growth and Companies Stuck in Pilots

A separate, larger dataset pointed to the same mechanism. PwC’s 2026 Global AI Jobs Barometer, drawn from more than 1 billion job postings across 27 countries, found that companies most able to use AI grew headcount 52% in 2025 against a 2018 baseline, compared with 36% for the least AI-exposed companies. Wages at those same companies rose 24% compared to 17% for lighter-spending peers.

The divide sharpens at entry level. The PwC study found that, based on an analysis of 2.4 million U.S. entry-level job postings, AI-exposed junior roles are seven times more likely than less-exposed roles to require traditionally senior skills, such as leadership and judgment. Postings for those “seniorized” entry-level roles grew 35% since 2019, while postings for other entry-level roles shrank 10% over the same period.

PwC’s separate AI Performance study, based on a survey of 1,217 senior executives, found that 74% of AI’s economic value is being captured by just 20% of organizations. Top-performing companies were roughly two to three times more likely than their peers to use AI to pursue new growth opportunities, rather than simply layering AI tools onto existing workflows.

For all PYMNTS AI coverage, subscribe to the daily AI Newsletter.