There was obvious over-hiring in the couple years after COVID while interest rates were low. A lot of companies corrected and laid off staff when that stopped.

This was before LLMs writing code was a daily discussion topic. Blaming every layoff on AI is mostly people connecting trending headlines together.

I don't think it's copium because it doesn't really matter if it's due to AI or COVID-era ZIRP-infused overhiring. If your company hasn't done multiple rounds of layoffs since 2022, they're going to come.