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Generative AI as Seniority-Biased Technological Change

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121–130 of 197 posts

Re: Generative AI as Seniority-Biased Technological Change

#121
post #18

It's pretty clear this is happening. The question is... is this based on existing capability of LLMs to do these jobs? Or are companies doing this on the expectation that AI is advanced enough to pick up the slack? I have observed a disconnect in which management is typically far more optimistic about AI being capable of performing a specific task than are the workers who currently perform that task. And to what exte…

Is it happening?

Re: Generative AI as Seniority-Biased Technological Change

#123
post #18

It's pretty clear this is happening. The question is... is this based on existing capability of LLMs to do these jobs? Or are companies doing this on the expectation that AI is advanced enough to pick up the slack? I have observed a disconnect in which management is typically far more optimistic about AI being capable of performing a specific task than are the workers who currently perform that task. And to what exte…

The question of reasoning doesn't really matter once you show its happening.

When you constrict the market like they have done, you naturally get distortions, and the adversarial nature of the market fails to perform economic calculation potentially leading to grave consequences. Even at this point, whipsaws would be quite destructive. I know people who have abandoned their careers due to lack of job availability for the foreseeable future. They were searching for years with no recovery.

When you destroy a pipeline of career development for short-term profit which is possible because of the decoupled nature of money-printing/credit facility, decisions made are psychologically sticky. When there is no economic benefit for competency, the smart people leave for a market where this is possible.

The smart people I know right now are quietly preparing for socio-economic collapse as a result of runaway money-printing. When you have a runaway dangerous machine, you can either step back and let it destroy itself (isolating yourself), or you can accelerate the breakdown of its dependent cycles. Many choose the former, since the latter carries existential risk for no real benefit in the short-term but the latter would result in the least amount of causalties.

70% of the economy covers the white-collar market, which will be gone soon, not because the jobs can be replaced by AI, but because the business leaders in consolidated industry all decide to replace workers becoming the instrument of their own demise through deflationary economics.

Re: Generative AI as Seniority-Biased Technological Change

#125
post #119
post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Give your juniors reasons to stay at your company? It's not hard if the company cares at all.

>It's not hard if the company cares at all. It's pretty hard for a non-big tech company to pay big tech level salaries.

You can incentivize people to stay with things other than salary. Salary plays a part of course, but there is a lot of other aspects that make staying at a job worthwhile.

Re: Generative AI as Seniority-Biased Technological Change

#126
post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Junior devs eventually will have been brought up with agentic coding, etc. Hopefully whatever the "new way" becomes is how they'll be taught. Currently part of the problem is the taboo using AI coding in undergrad CS programs. And I don't know the answer. But someone will find the right way to teach new/better ways of working with and without generative AI. It may just become second nature to everyone.

As an occasional uni TA, I'm leaning toward banning LLM for easy coursework while allowing it on more difficult & open-ended ones. Pretty sure it's a self-destructive move for a CS or software engineering student to pass foundational courses like discrete math, intro to programming, algorithm & data structure using LLM. You can't learn how to write if all you do is read. LLM will 1-shot the homework, and the student…

Exactly. When I was in school even in 80's, it was common to have to hand write out a program during an exam. You had to know stuff in the old days.

Re: Generative AI as Seniority-Biased Technological Change

#127
post #18

It's pretty clear this is happening. The question is... is this based on existing capability of LLMs to do these jobs? Or are companies doing this on the expectation that AI is advanced enough to pick up the slack? I have observed a disconnect in which management is typically far more optimistic about AI being capable of performing a specific task than are the workers who currently perform that task. And to what exte…

I do not see anything in this study that accounts for the decline in economic activity. Is it AI replacing the jobs, or is it that companies are not optimistically hiring, which disproportionally impacts entry level jobs?

A lot of big tech companies are being very opportunistic and reducing hiring/laying-off under the guise of A.I. but really it's weak economy.

Re: Generative AI as Seniority-Biased Technological Change

#128
Salary wise, we are in a race to the bottom. Massive outsourcing of jobs to India and similar where wages are much lower than comparable US employees coupled with Ai replacing entry level roles.

On a longer time scale you have humanoid robots potentially coming as well. Self driving cars and trucks are going to torpedo trucking and low pay positions such as Uber // taxi driver. The wealth is getting centralized amongst a couple dozen high tech companies.

All in all I am pretty negative on the prospects for young people as they enter the workforce and additionally for older tech people as they are currently operating in an environment where losing your job very possibly means the end of the road.

Re: Generative AI as Seniority-Biased Technological Change

#129
post #18

It's pretty clear this is happening. The question is... is this based on existing capability of LLMs to do these jobs? Or are companies doing this on the expectation that AI is advanced enough to pick up the slack? I have observed a disconnect in which management is typically far more optimistic about AI being capable of performing a specific task than are the workers who currently perform that task. And to what exte…

I've yet to see any company show actual factual revenue increase from employing AI. So I doubt they have created the internal analysis structures to ensure what exactly they're using AI for.

Re: Generative AI as Seniority-Biased Technological Change

#130
post #119
post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Give your juniors reasons to stay at your company? It's not hard if the company cares at all.

>It's not hard if the company cares at all. It's pretty hard for a non-big tech company to pay big tech level salaries.

And most of my friends and colleagues would take a full remote role that pays half what big tech, 5 days in office pays. Add in an extra week of PTO and you have a great pitch to devs.
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