Artificial intelligence and automation technologies are precipitating an unprecedented structural disruption of global labour markets. This paper argues that the mass-layoff wave observed across the United States and Europe since 2023—accelerating sharply through 2025 and into 2026—constitutes the leading edge of a displacement shock whose full force is yet to be felt in the Global South. Drawing on corporate disclosure data, labour-market statistics from Challenger, Gray Labour-cost differentials that reduce the economic viability of early automation; Shallow capital markets; Weaker institutional capacity; and The time required for multinational technology adoption cycles to cascade downstream. We also find that this delay is finite and narrowing: cloud-based AI services are dramatically lowering the capital threshold for automation, and several developing nations—notably Brazil and India—are already exhibiting early-onset displacement signals in fintech, call centres, and administrative services. Without proactive policy intervention, a second, potentially more severe, wave of displacement is imminent in economies least equipped to absorb it.
Zen Revista (Sat,) studied this question.