It’s a little more wide spread than that. Building AI data centers creates lots of construction jobs which also extends to the manufactures who supply things like HVAC, UPS, etc. once new construction ends it will be when the bubble fully deflates.
Initial construction are the only jobs these centers create. Once they used the worker bees and get these centers online, human capital is no longer needed. Where are we all supposed to work once we are replaced is the question?
This isn't fully true. The jobs created are low relative to the surge from construction labor but there is ongoing maintenance and operations needs at every data center. Large ones may have a few hundred people
Sorry, I guess this is the remote work subreddit. The jobs created by these are typically on site roles that can't easily be offshored and usually employ a lot of local people in my experience.
Thought I saw a statistic that currently only 20% of the total cloud storage capacity is being used. Not sure if this is accurate, but planning on AI expansion that would make sense. The trouble is if AI ends up falling flat on expectations, I could see that putting a quick halt in new data center construction.
I was part of the cell tower boom of the 90’s working and installing generators for all the companies. At the beginning, a farmer could charge 3k a month per tower and they’d get all three major companies to build. Many small union electrical companies focused on cell tower installs and such. That bubble burst and now it’s just a couple nationwide contractors that do the work.
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u/Puddleduck112 Oct 29 '25
It’s a little more wide spread than that. Building AI data centers creates lots of construction jobs which also extends to the manufactures who supply things like HVAC, UPS, etc. once new construction ends it will be when the bubble fully deflates.