A Ramp and Revelio Labs joint report finds that companies making sustained, intensive investments in artificial intelligence tend to increase staff levels — including entry-level positions — rather than uniformly cutting jobs. The two organizations track corporate AI spending and workforce records, respectively, covering nearly 22,000 companies.
According to the report, “high-intensity adopters” — firms that spent on average $30 per employee per month on AI in the first three months — experienced a 10.2% increase in headcount. Job growth appeared across functions, not only in engineering but also in sales, administration, customer service, finance, marketing, and scientific roles.
The strongest gains were observed in the information sector, which includes software, internet, media, and tech-adjacent firms. The report’s authors caution, however, against broad generalizations: “This paper does not show that AI universally creates jobs,” they write, “but it does counter claims that AI will lead to broad job losses.”
That nuance matters because other data paint a different picture. Through May 2026, companies announced close to 90,000 job cuts tied to AI, and some projections suggest up to 15% of U.S. jobs could be eliminated by AI over the next five years. A separate Goldman Sachs analysis found AI has already removed roughly 16,000 net jobs per month over the past year, with Gen Z and entry-level workers disproportionately affected. Yet within tech-forward firms the Ramp–Revelio study reports entry-level headcount rose by 12%.
The authors propose an interpretation that reconciles these findings: AI can act not only as a labor-substituting technology but also as a lever for firm expansion. "For software and technology firms, AI can make core output cheaper or faster to produce: writing code, debugging, building internal tools, producing technical documentation, and supporting product development," the report reads. "Lower production costs in these workflows can raise the return to expanding the whole firm, not just the engineering team."
Crucially, the report finds that companies that only purchase subscriptions or run pilots without sustained investments generally do not see headcount gains. That pattern suggests a potential widening gap between firms that have the capital, technical staff, founder networks, and management bandwidth to convert AI adoption into real business gains, and those that remain at the experimentation stage. As the authors put it: "Firms without those channels may fall behind."
In summary, Ramp and Revelio Labs document a correlation between intensive, sustained AI spending and headcount growth in certain contexts, but they stop short of claiming a universal causal effect. The benefits appear concentrated in tech-forward, often fast-growing companies, raising concerns that AI-driven gains could accrue primarily to firms already well-resourced.
Key figures and caveats
- Sample covered: nearly 22,000 companies.
- Definition of high-intensity adopters: ~$30 per employee per month AI spending in the first three months.
- Headcount increase among high-intensity adopters: 10.2%.
- Entry-level headcount increase in tech-forward firms: 12%.
- Contrasting finding: Goldman Sachs estimated ~16,000 net jobs lost per month over the past year linked to AI.
- Other context: through May 2026, nearly 90,000 job cuts were announced as tied to AI; some projections put potential U.S. job eliminations at up to 15% over five years.
Further research is needed to determine how much of the hiring surge at AI-adopting companies is directly attributable to AI-driven productivity changes versus other factors such as pre-existing growth trajectories, venture financing, or broader industry dynamics.
