Artificial intelligence is already reshaping hiring patterns across major developed economies, with entry-level positions for analysts, programmers, and support staff contracting sharply as companies deploy AI tools to augment routine tasks—a shift that is disproportionately affecting younger workers seeking to enter professional careers.
Data from Adzuna, which tracks millions of job listings across the UK, reveals the scale of the shift: entry-level vacancies fell by 31.9 per cent between November 2022 and mid-2025, while the share of entry-level jobs in the overall labour market declined from 29 per cent to 25 per cent over the same period. In the United States, similar trends are visible in technology and finance firms, which are slowing the hiring of entry-level analysts, programmers and support staff as AI tools augment research, drafting and coding tasks.
The pattern is emerging as AI adoption accelerates globally. According to analysis by Deloitte Access Economics, AI's largest employment impacts are likely to be in roles defined by routine automatable tasks that do not always require the application of human soft skills, including a range of clerical and information processing occupations. In Australia, employment growth in these occupations is weaker than employment growth in the broader labour market, a trend that predates recent AI developments but is now being accelerated.
Who Bears the Burden
Younger workers face heightened exposure to AI-driven labour market disruption. In November 2025, workers aged 15–24 made up 22.9 per cent of employment in AI-disrupted roles, compared with 15.2 per cent of overall employment. This concentration reflects the reality that entry-level positions—the traditional gateway to professional careers—are precisely those roles most vulnerable to AI augmentation.
The shift is occurring not through mass layoffs, but through hiring freezes and reduced demand. According to The Australian, AI's first labour market effects are emerging through hiring patterns and weaker demand, rather than large-scale job losses. The US Bureau of Labor Statistics reported in February 2026 that 181,000 jobs were added to the US economy over the course of 2025, down from 2.0 million in 2024, despite robust real GDP growth and strong labour productivity growth.
The Adoption Curve Ahead
Companies in the US and UK are slightly further along the AI adoption curve than Australia, providing an indication of what may come next. Most AI use remains informal, but some organisations are beginning to implement the technology at scale. The critical next step, according to workforce analysts, is the shift from organic, individual AI experimentation to enterprise-wide integration.
Deloitte Access Economics expects employment growth to diverge sharply across occupation groups in coming years. Community and personal service workers, trades workers and many professionals are forecast to see robust demand, while AI-exposed professions, managers, clerical and administrative staff and sales workers may see softer demand. This divergence signals that the labour market is not simply contracting, but restructuring—with consequences that fall heaviest on those seeking entry-level pathways into professional work.
David Rumbens, a Partner at Deloitte Access Economics, emphasizes that workforce decisions should be grounded in real adoption patterns, operational needs and sector-specific developments rather than broad headlines or speculation. Yet the data already visible in UK and US hiring patterns suggests that for younger workers, the AI transition is not theoretical—it is reshaping the job market now.
In Australia, despite younger workers' higher exposure to AI-disrupted roles, overall data does not yet point to AI reducing demand for younger workers. This reinforces the idea that Australia is further behind on the AI adoption curve and shows how labour market outcomes depend not just on the pace of AI adoption but also on how firms redesign jobs and industry-specific factors. However, the evidence is mounting that AI-driven workforce change will be a labour market feature over the next few years.
Why This Matters:
Entry-level hiring is the mechanism through which young people transition from education to stable employment, build professional networks, and develop skills that determine lifetime earnings. A sustained contraction in entry-level vacancies—31.9 per cent over three years in the UK alone—represents a structural barrier to economic mobility for an entire cohort of workers. When AI adoption accelerates hiring freezes in precisely those roles, the burden falls disproportionately on those with fewest alternatives: younger workers without established credentials or professional networks. This pattern raises urgent questions about whether firms adopting AI at scale will invest in retraining and job redesign, or whether the technology will simply hollow out the entry-level labour market, widening inequality and reducing opportunity for younger generations to build careers in professional fields.