Jack Dorsey announced 4,000 layoffs at Block in February 2026, blaming AI for replacing developers. Yet nobody asks the obvious question: if AI can replace 4,000 engineers, why not replace the CEO? The median S&P 500 CEO earns $17.1 million annually—equivalent to 85 senior software engineers. That's just salary. The real cost emerges when executives make billion-dollar mistakes.

Dorsey's tenure exemplifies the problem. He tripled Block's headcount from 3,900 to over 12,000 between 2019 and 2022. The stock peaked above $275 in 2021, then dropped over 75%. He built duplicate company structures for Square and Cash App, later calling it an incorrect decision. Five months after spending $68.1 million on a single company event in September 2025, he cut 4,000 people and blamed AI. None of this is an AI story. All of it is a management story.

Here's the math: an AI system handling strategy, capital allocation, and operational coordination costs maybe $3 million fully loaded for the human A-suite. That's $14 million in annual savings against the median CEO package alone. Replace the decision-maker with a system, and the entire executive layer simplifies. The people who would need to approve this change are the ones being replaced. CEOs set strategy. Boards approve CEO compensation. Boards are populated by current and former CEOs. The AI-replaces-developers story persists because developers don't control the narrative. They don't sit on boards. They don't write shareholder letters. They don't go on CNBC.