PricewaterhouseCoopers’s U.S. unit is laying off about 1,800 workers, its first formal layoffs since 2009

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confused_boner@reddit (OP)

The cuts, about half of which are offshore, span employees ranging from associates to managing directors and include business services, audit and tax, the people said.

PwC plans to notify those affected, roughly 2.5% of the workforce at the U.S. unit, in October, the people said.

The executive said he would be remiss if he didn’t acknowledge the announcement was being made on Sept. 11, a day on which the firm lost five colleagues.

Theory in /r/Accounting by /u/Juicebomb35:

"My significant other is in Public Relations and she said they would never do this if their hand wasn't forced. Likely means WSJ got ahold of the info and was going to release the story and PwC could either play ball and beat it with their own press release or have the info show up in the media first."

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Pontiacsentinel@reddit

$78B fraud that audits didn't show anything? There's more to that story, hope someone writes a book on it.

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jst4wrk7617@reddit

Making people wait 3+ weeks to find out if they’re losing their job seems pretty cruel.

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AntiSonOfBitchamajig@reddit

Add it to the pile, the numbers of layoffs and hours reductions I've been hearing... is like the top of a roller coaster.

Yield curve uninversion,
FED lowing rates this month,
Other countries already have been lowering rates,
Vehicle market crash, i'm hearing rumor they're repo-ing vehicles off dealer lots even.
Vehicle factories from Detroit, Elkhart, down i75 are struggling and majorly slowing... Which concerns me for my area all along there.
Local sales market is flush compared to last 4+ years, and things aren't selling now. See more large ticket items just not moving this whole summer sitting in people's front yards like vehicles, machinery, motorcycles, etc.
Thrift stores are thin, Pawn shops are full.

Just... "that feel" / classic signs all around.

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idk I think its different we were riding high off a ludicrous wave of violence and supremacy from 2001 last time around and this time we are the butt of the joke and the 'sick man of Europe' - soft and hard power internationally having been in freefall for nearly a decade.

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AntiSonOfBitchamajig@reddit

Hmm, my core belief is that it always boils down to the money. And, I believe since 2001 market downturn and especially 08, they've taken inflation to the point where the common standard of living has declined from past generations... leading into a demographics collapse. Where, politicians realize among the few solutions, immigration could slow it / pad the tax base to drag out sovereign debt collapse. The central banks through half the world are between a rock and a hard place... and the banks below them even more so. The lengths they've gone already has been extraordinary, I saw a "negative treasury bond" in the US in 2021... literally negative. Or the FED creating SPVs through Blackrock to buy securities in the stock market in 2020... sending checks and literally tens of thousands to the average man through EIDL and hundreds of thousands through PPP that were never recovered..... Saw markets frozen on multiple occasions to "prevent losses" for the billionaire brokers and private equity firms. So much I have seen in just 4 years, it has a casino feel, where even if you win "at the slots" the house can say the machine "malfunctioned" ... they'll misallocate until slowly, then all at once it fails, in the trust of the system by it's own people. Just as happened to every fiat currency the world over in the last 700+ years. The history is echoing.

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TopAd1369@reddit

When you read lords of finance and ascent of money there are a lot of parallels to past bubbles bursting. The magic of markets has always been innovation leading to a higher standard of living. It’s not clear that AI will deliver that under capitalism. The likely first step is massive layoffs as demand for white collar labor declines. Those are not people the working poor are going to empathize with after being told to learn to code after not being able to dig coal any longer. My guess is that we have a major depression and then form a “Newer Deal” around some form of UBI social safety net. It’s the only way you reset the game to something that will be acceptable to the vast majority of players. The other answer, unfortunately, is global war and you kill off the plebs. Otherwise expect chaos and upheaval socially over the next few years.

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AntiSonOfBitchamajig@reddit

The cycles historically end in war. The great thing that gives me hope, is that we're more connected than ever and are able to see more.... but now being blinded by whats fake or real due to AI online. It is SCARY how far graphics have come in video where the average man would mistake it for real.

As far as "AI in the current system" , It will be as CGP Grey described in his YouTube Video "humans need not apply" The major issue I see is, who owns all the bots?... monopolies will have gone well too far if not split up enough.

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TopAd1369@reddit

If there is a monetary barrier to training AI, then the corps own it. If we have free access to information then anyone can build an AI. I’m for the latter

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AntiSonOfBitchamajig@reddit

It may be like i-robot, general intelligence bots doing tons of "simple things" everywhere. which... would REALLY hit the "simple workers" I already see this talking with my grandfather before he died... him telling me "all I need to do is get a factory job like he did" to support a home wife, 4 bedroom house on 10 acres, 6 kids and their college, vacations, a few bad habits, investments and retirement, pension and healthcare...etc. My grandfather was a made man for being a simple worker. Today, nearly everyone realizes such work will not get you ahead.

Doctors in my circle are even carrying multiple jobs, you see highly educated people taking multiple jobs to live what used to be "normal" lives. and our elders are just wondering how the hell it isn't working. Its the most frustrating thing for the millennials and gen z's.

We do, however, objectively live a higher quality of life through the technology.

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Goblinboogers@reddit

I hope that when we have this 'soft landing' we dont find out the floor is lava

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BardanoBois@reddit

Here we go