November 3, 2025
Ghost jobs vs ghostwriters
I analyzed 180M jobs to see what jobs AI is replacing today
Creatives panic, coders chill, and one guy lets AI do his taxes
TLDR: Study says creative execution roles dropped hard while software engineering looks relatively stable. Comments erupt over missing job counts and macro weirdness, with jokes about AI filing taxes and debates on why mobile jobs dipped—arguing whether it’s true AI disruption or just a weird job market.
An analysis of 180 million job postings claims the AI squeeze is hitting “hands-on” creatives the hardest—think graphic artists (-33%), photographers (-28%), and writers (-28%)—while creative bosses and decision-makers are mostly fine. Cue comment-section chaos. One camp is smugly calm: “Software engineers are still safe,” cheers a top comment, dunking on months of doomscroll hype that coding jobs were next. Another camp calls foul on the math, noting there’s no count of actual jobs—just percentages. “Where’s the scale?” asks a data hawk, arguing you can’t compare a tiny bump in one field to a massive drop in another without raw numbers.
There’s also a spicy subplot: US politics. Compliance and sustainability roles cratered—-29% and -28%—and commenters hint that shifting rules and ESG (environmental, social, and governance) backlash, not AI, did the damage. Meanwhile, a jokester bragged “I’ve got AI doing my taxes,” turning CPAs into the latest “uh-oh” profession. Mobile dev roles dipped a modest 5%, sparking theories that companies are ditching bespoke apps for cheaper cross‑platform tools—and maybe just caring less about apps altogether.
The vibe? Creatives feel replaced, coders feel vindicated, skeptics want better receipts, and everyone’s making memes about “ghost jobs vs. ghostwriters.”
Key Points
- •The study analyzed ~180M global job postings (Jan 2023–Oct 2025) using Revealera data to compare 2025 vs 2024 changes.
- •Overall job postings fell 8% in 2025 versus 2024; Indeed reported a comparable 7.3% YoY decline in the US.
- •Creative execution roles saw the largest declines: computer graphic artists (-33%), photographers (-28%), writers (-28); journalists/reporters (-22%).
- •These declines persisted over two years, e.g., computer graphic artists down 12% in 2024 and 33% in 2025; similar patterns for writers and photographers.
- •Regulatory/environmental roles also dropped sharply: corporate compliance specialists (-29%), sustainability specialists (-28%), environmental technicians (-26%), with declines accelerating.