Over 160 companies in New York state have filed notices of mass layoffs since last March. None—in a group that includes Amazon, Goldman Sachs, and other employers that are adopting AI tools—attributed their workforce cuts in those filings to “technological innovation or automation.”

That option was added 11 months ago to a required question on paperwork that businesses with 50 or more employees must file with the state to notify of sizable job losses. New York’s Department of Labor told WIRED that, as of the end of January, no employer had marked tech as the reason for their workforce reduction.

Over the past couple of years, many companies have celebrated offloading repetitive tasks such as customer service, sales, and accounting to AI systems. But saying that they are dumping human workers in favor of AI agents or robots can risk reputational harm. And economists face challenges tracing layoffs to tech advancements because companies can take decades to fully reorganize around new ways of working.

Enter New York governor Kathy Hochul. To get a better handle on the current reality, she ordered the Department of Labor to...