Amazon Layoffs 2023: What to Know as AMZN Job Cuts Surpass Estimates

$Amazon (AMZN.US)$ layoffs are a hot topic today as the company’s job cuts have surpassed estimates.
Andy Jassy, CEO of Amazon, revealed that job cuts at the company will rise past 18,000 employees during a public meeting yesterday. Prior estimates claimed that the company would eliminate 17,000 jobs.
Those affected by the Amazon layoffs will mostly come from the company’s e-commerce and human resources divisions. This has the cuts representing about 6% of the 300,000 corporate workers at the company. However, it’s worth noting that AMZN has over 1.5 million employees when including warehouse workers.
Bezos Could Return to Amazon
The latest Amazon layoffs build on the problems the e-commerce company has been seeing over the last year. That includes poor earnings performance as consumers cut back spending due to inflation and recession concerns.
With that comes speculation that Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon, may return to the CEO role. Ritholtz Wealth Management managing partner Michael Batnick believes this will happen. The move would make sense as other former CEOs, such as $Starbucks (SBUX.US)$ founder Howard Schultz and $Disney (DIS.US)$ ’s Bob Iger, return to their former roles amid economic turmoil.