February 16, 2026
Pink slips and hot takes
"I Was a Director at Amex When They Started Replacing Us with $30K Workers" [video]
Ex-Amex boss drops bomb; commenters split between “that’s capitalism” and “protect our jobs”
TLDR: Amex opened its largest office ever in India as an ex-director claims U.S. tech roles are being replaced by lower-cost overseas hires. Commenters split between “that’s global capitalism,” “politics won’t stop offshoring,” and “brace for AI + outsourcing,” with worries about quality and job security making this a wake-up call for desk workers everywhere.
A former American Express engineering director says the quiet part out loud: after Amex opened a massive 1,000,000 sq ft office in Gurugram, India—the biggest in company history—he claims the company began swapping U.S. tech teams for $30K overseas hires. In his video, Dr. Josh C. Simmons says he led “AI-powered” projects like lending and buy-now-pay-later apps and watched a “systematic” shift play out. The internet did what it does best: fight about it.
One loud camp shrugged, that’s capitalism, baby, arguing jobs flow to cheaper markets—even if, as one commenter noted, it’s “not always more efficient.” Another tore into U.S. politics, saying both parties are too stuck in their beliefs to ever push back on offshoring. The doomer squad went full black-pill: between automation and outsourcing, office jobs are “here today, gone at lunch,” so build a backup plan.
Meanwhile, drama flared when one user framed it as “enemies making a mistake,” prompting replies of “who’s the enemy—robots, spreadsheets, or the C-suite?” Others dragged quality concerns, sharing horror stories of follow-the-sun code and broken handoffs. Jokes flew too: “AI = Automated Income-cuts,” and “One million square feet of hot-desking, one million pink slips?” Whether you call it efficiency or betrayal, the comments are on fire.
Key Points
- •American Express opened a 1,000,000 sq ft office in Gurugram, India, described as its largest ever.
- •Dr. Josh C. Simmons is a former engineering director at American Express and shares an internal account.
- •He worked within the company’s “AI-powered innovation” organization.
- •His teams built lending and buy-now-pay-later (BNPL) web applications used by customers.
- •He claims there was a systematic effort to replace American tech workers with offshore hires; the title cites “$30K workers.”