Companies are aggressively cutting costs and headcount as a primary strategic lever—Delta slashing snacks, PayPal and Cboe cutting 20% of staff, Estée Lauder targeting 10,000 job cuts. These moves prioritize short-term margin expansion and operational streamlining over customer experience or human capital. This is Efficiency reasserting itself as the dominant value, but the costs are visible: stripped amenities, leadership instability, and reduced service quality.