California Governor Acts on AI Workforce Disruption as Silicon Valley Sheds 114,000 Jobs

California Governor Gavin Newsom signed a “first-in-the-nation executive order” on Thursday to tackle artificial intelligence (AI) workforce disruption. 

The order directs California to prepare workers, small businesses, and communities for economic impact from AI.

What the California Governor’s Order Covers

The order convenes a broad group of universities, economists, labor specialists, state agencies, and industry executives. They will draft new policies and track signals of where AI is cutting jobs. 

The goal is to help California workers, not just tech firms, share in AI’s productivity gains. The policy menu includes new severance rules, employment insurance, and transition payments for displaced workers. 

Other ideas under study include worker-owned company structures, universal basic capital programs, and broader job training. The order also seeks better hiring and payroll data so the state can spot layoff trends sooner.

“California has never sat back and watched as the future happened to us… Today is just the first step as we rewrite policy and direction, creating a future of work that works for all,” Newsom said.

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The Employment Development Department (EDD) will build a public dashboard tracking AI impact by sector. The Labor and Workforce Development Agency must recommend updates to the California Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) Act within 180 days.

The order also creates an AI playbook for job training and a single online portal for exploring government services.

Why California Is Acting Now

The action arrives as tech layoffs accelerate across Silicon Valley. Layoffs.fyi has tracked more than 114,000 job cuts at 150 tech companies in 2026.

ClickUp slashed 22% of its staff on Thursday. CEO Zeb Evans tied the cuts to his vision of a “100x organization.” Intuit announced 3,000 layoffs the same week.

Meta cut 8,000 jobs this week. Standard Chartered also plans to slash more than 15% of corporate function roles by 2030.

California, home to 33 of the world’s top 50 private AI companies, sits at the center of the disruption.

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