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AI isn't replacing jobs. AI spending is

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Re: AI isn't replacing jobs. AI spending is

#91

Post by CivBase »

dehrmann wrote: post #78
Glyptodon wrote: post #20

As a recently laid of senior engineer, to the extent that my job was replaced, it was replaced with offshore junior devs who'd already been working with the company for over year with a pretty rough level of productivity by man-hour, though maybe taking 3x the time to get things done is worth it if they're cheap enough. Which is to say I see my layoff as as cost cutting backed by a premise that there is no value in r…

Hacker News doesn't like to hear it, but remote work is a big part of this. All that effort convincing management you're just as effective working remotely was also a collective sales pitch to outsource your role.

I'd be more inclined to work in the office if most of my coworkers weren't in India anyways. I can't exactly have water cooler talk with Manglesh while he's asleep on the opposite side of the planet. At least at home I don't have to spend 10 minutes of each meeting finding an empty conference room and getting the audio/video setup to barely function.

Re: AI isn't replacing jobs. AI spending is

#92

Post by hirako2000 »

Glyptodon wrote: post #20

As a recently laid of senior engineer, to the extent that my job was replaced, it was replaced with offshore junior devs who'd already been working with the company for over year with a pretty rough level of productivity by man-hour, though maybe taking 3x the time to get things done is worth it if they're cheap enough. Which is to say I see my layoff as as cost cutting backed by a premise that there is no value in r…

Exactly this, articles of that tone are starting to surface. AI is often the pretext, because it makes sense to replace labour with technology. The dissonance is why those who make layoff decisions refuse to accept reality, that AI does not replace staff.

One thing also contradicting the "AI can do it" argument, is that a business's playbook is to rather expand the work force in order to multiply the effect of technology. Yet they lay off in waves.

There is no dissonance, just a disguise: Several big tech companies in the US cut their workforce, in the US, while expanding it in countries where talent is cheaper.

Paradoxally, junior folks have it even worse. It has become very difficult to land a job without experience, again, in the US. It all makes sense, if you replace US based senior staff with Junior staff on different time zone, and having a different culture, you are left with nobody to mentor and supervise junior so staff.

I still can't explain how ending up with more Junior staff, offshore, less senior staff and little to no Junior staff locally will pay off in the long term.

I guess I will figure that out, but for now that's one piece of the puzzle I can only call an "economic downturn" outlook.

Re: AI isn't replacing jobs. AI spending is

#93

Post by pjmlp »

I can tell that editors doing CMS translations, marketing images have certainly been replaced.

Likewise many tasks I used to do with Java, .NET, Node.js, have been replaced by low code/no code tools with agentic orchestration.

Thinking that AI isn't replacing jobs is wishful thinking.

Re: AI isn't replacing jobs. AI spending is

#94

Post by echelon »

dehrmann wrote: post #78
Glyptodon wrote: post #20

As a recently laid of senior engineer, to the extent that my job was replaced, it was replaced with offshore junior devs who'd already been working with the company for over year with a pretty rough level of productivity by man-hour, though maybe taking 3x the time to get things done is worth it if they're cheap enough. Which is to say I see my layoff as as cost cutting backed by a premise that there is no value in r…

Hacker News doesn't like to hear it, but remote work is a big part of this. All that effort convincing management you're just as effective working remotely was also a collective sales pitch to outsource your role.

This is the biggest unspoken story in tech.

The era of American developer exceptionalism is over.

Talent abroad has access to the same tools, education, and increasingly, network. American engineers will be replaced wholesale with overseas engineers that cost a fraction of American labor.

You can hire talented React engineers for $50k that will work harder than their American counterparts.

It's not just React. Overseas markets have DevOps, SREs, embedded, systems engineers, you name it.

For years Americans joked that overseas labor was subpar. It's not, or at least it isn't in today's world.

Re: AI isn't replacing jobs. AI spending is

#96

Post by gregates »

zer00eyz wrote: post #19

This should shock no one. Over the last 20 years of tech, the giants have taken the smartest folks out there and put golden handcuffs on them. You could hire up all the smart folks and put them to work, or leave them out there and have them compete with you. With the launch of cloud providers and (expensive) dynamic scaling the problem only got worse. Think about hiring in the pandemic. Every one at home, with a stim…

Funny to me how many of the replies to this comment are assuming you mean all these "punk" startups will be possible because of AI, when your actual comment says nothing of the sort.

Re: AI isn't replacing jobs. AI spending is

#97

Post by thesmtsolver »

echelon wrote: post #94
dehrmann wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hacker News doesn't like to hear it, but remote work is a big part of this. All that effort convincing management you're just as effective working remotely was also a collective sales pitch to outsource your role.

This is the biggest unspoken story in tech. The era of American developer exceptionalism is over. Talent abroad has access to the same tools, education, and increasingly, network. American engineers will be replaced wholesale with overseas engineers that cost a fraction of American labor. You can hire talented React engineers for $50k that will work harder than their American counterparts. It's not just React. Overse…

Any data backing this? If this were the case, why isn’t most innovation done outside the US?

Jobs that have a high 0-1 component will still be in the US but jobs that are more 1-n may be offshored.

Re: AI isn't replacing jobs. AI spending is

#98

Post by J_Shelby_J »

echelon wrote: post #94
dehrmann wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hacker News doesn't like to hear it, but remote work is a big part of this. All that effort convincing management you're just as effective working remotely was also a collective sales pitch to outsource your role.

This is the biggest unspoken story in tech. The era of American developer exceptionalism is over. Talent abroad has access to the same tools, education, and increasingly, network. American engineers will be replaced wholesale with overseas engineers that cost a fraction of American labor. You can hire talented React engineers for $50k that will work harder than their American counterparts. It's not just React. Overse…

If software engineering is not special and can be done by anyone, so can any other role in a business. So it follows that all American roles will be offshored eventually, including ownership of the company itself - or American businesses will be universally out competed.

Re: AI isn't replacing jobs. AI spending is

#99

Post by vishnugupta »

echelon wrote: post #94
dehrmann wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hacker News doesn't like to hear it, but remote work is a big part of this. All that effort convincing management you're just as effective working remotely was also a collective sales pitch to outsource your role.

This is the biggest unspoken story in tech. The era of American developer exceptionalism is over. Talent abroad has access to the same tools, education, and increasingly, network. American engineers will be replaced wholesale with overseas engineers that cost a fraction of American labor. You can hire talented React engineers for $50k that will work harder than their American counterparts. It's not just React. Overse…

Absolutely! $50k is ₹45,00,000 which is at the 95th percentile of tech salary in India across all levels of seniority.

So yeah it’s not surprising that jobs are going offshore.

Re: AI isn't replacing jobs. AI spending is

#100

Post by brazukadev »

thesmtsolver wrote: post #97
echelon wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the biggest unspoken story in tech. The era of American developer exceptionalism is over. Talent abroad has access to the same tools, education, and increasingly, network. American engineers will be replaced wholesale with overseas engineers that cost a fraction of American labor. You can hire talented React engineers for $50k that will work harder than their American counterparts. It's not just React. Overse…

Any data backing this? If this were the case, why isn’t most innovation done outside the US? Jobs that have a high 0-1 component will still be in the US but jobs that are more 1-n may be offshored.

> If this were the case, why isn’t most innovation done outside the US?

Capital

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