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Where is the AI jobs crisis?

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Re: Where is the AI jobs crisis?

#221

Post by littlexsparkee »

bwestergard wrote: post #97
atleastoptimal wrote: post #69

It's crazy that so often I see articles, here on HN and elsewhere, where some pundit claims that there is no AI job crisis, AI isn't replacing any jobs, that layoffs are actually due to post-pandemic ZIRP overhiring, etc. But then people who work in actual tech companies come in and explicitly say they are not hiring any juniors anymore specifically because AI is good enough to do most of what juniors do, and that se…

The decline in junior hiring began before ChatGPT had wide adoption, so AI is not a likely cause. https://www.employamerica.org/labor-market-analysis/dont-bla... The New York Fed has also released some research suggesting remote work has been a major factor differentially affecting early career workers. https://libertystreeteconomics.newyorkfed.org/2026/06/remote... "But then people who work in actual tech companies…

There's no rule that a phenomenon needs 1 cause - the decline could've been junior cuts to start after '22 since they have less seniority and impact, followed by a substitution effect after broad LLM adoption. I don't doubt that remote had an additive effect on productivity via mentoring etc as well.

Re: Where is the AI jobs crisis?

#222

Post by piloto_ciego »

lifeisstillgood wrote: post #204
piloto_ciego wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hate to be "that guy" but you're crazy if you don't see AI being able to do greenfield projects you'd accept. I mean, in your defense, last year I think you would have been right, but right now? Codex rocks, as does Claude. I am literally making money shipping a greenfield project to a customer right now. I'm basically a cheap consultant that is incrementally adding features to make something exactly what they want…

So to try and understand your position - you are hired by a small? Company in which sector? And you built an app that does what? And I think most importantly - how did you find the gig? Were they explicitly hiring a AI capable person to do X?

I run my own thing since the start of the year. I’m building little tools for an industry I’m highly familiar that needs very specific scheduling software, data tools, tracking tools etc. My old job was a boring as a government bureaucrat.

I started this by doing some work for an old employer that asked me to start by modernizing an excel spreadsheet into an app I made for them like 10 years ago? They kept asking for more though since, and they’re my biggest customer right now. Which is good because I only have the bandwidth for like one more place right now.

I’ve had a few sort of one off things with other places? But I’m working on getting another company in the same industry right now and I’ll be able to adapt most of the code I’ve built here for another company if they end up deciding to use me.

But my biggest value to companies is “I already know this industry extremely well.”

Re: Where is the AI jobs crisis?

#223

Post by BLKNSLVR »

woohanhan wrote: post #207

I am a manager with former FAANG experience followed by mid-size comanies. Most people here saying there is no AI job crisis dont know what they are talking about and talking out of their ass. I know plenty of people looking for job for months at this point. I am looking for 3+ months and have a few leads finally but nowhere close to offer. Remember, people have to live in these high cost GEOs (SF, Seattle, NYC and o…

This account was created an hour ago.

Personally, this makes me suspicious of calling out mods for censorship. This, in turn, makes me suspicious about the truthiness of any of the information presented.

I'm not agreeing or disagreeing with any of the opinions or experiences expressed.

Re: Where is the AI jobs crisis?

#224

Post by _se »

catigula wrote: post #140

We're on the cusp of it. Models JUST got good enough to be better than the average white collar worker at nearly everything. This literally is a brand new phenomenon; it's only a matter of time.

Literally the same thing people have been saying for two years. How gullible can you be.

Re: Where is the AI jobs crisis?

#225

Post by orangecoffee »

_se wrote: post #224
catigula wrote: post #140

We're on the cusp of it. Models JUST got good enough to be better than the average white collar worker at nearly everything. This literally is a brand new phenomenon; it's only a matter of time.

Literally the same thing people have been saying for two years. How gullible can you be.

Has there been anytime, when senior experts in a field, are consistently maintaining this time it's different? You can ignore this at your own peril.

Re: Where is the AI jobs crisis?

#227

Post by ChiperSoft »

james_marks wrote: post #162
sp1982 wrote: post #30

I run a job search site and I don't see a crisis in terms of job openings even for SWE - but there is very clear signal that AI is deeply getting embedded in every SWE job. https://corvi.careers/blog/global_software-engineering_jobs_...

In the news I hear about tech layoffs, but I am having a difficult time trying to hire high quality senior SWE's. Perhaps it's not the senior's that were hit by the layoffs, or I'm just looking in the wrong places. The big job sites feel rife with unqualified applicants and outright fraud, leaving me frankly unsure how to proceed. It feels like a crisis of candidates-to-job-openings matching, and AI has made it much…

Perhaps its because a good chunk of us looked at wtf is going on in tech right now and said "nah, I think I'll go be a farmer now."

Re: Where is the AI jobs crisis?

#228

Post by Ferret7446 »

mindcandy wrote: post #170

AFAICT, the "Rising layoffs year after year" news lately has been an intentional misreporting of "Layoff rates slowly returning to normal after the hiring spree during COVID stimulation" https://blog.glassdoor.com/site-us/wp-content/uploads/sites/... https://www.glassdoor.com/blog/worklife-trends-2026/ But, CEOs figured out that if they blame layoffs on AI, stock go up a lot. Reporters know that anxiety about AI driv…

I think this is a cope. It is not only the tech sectors facing poor labor market, it's everything. People can't find jobs

Re: Where is the AI jobs crisis?

#229

Post by mbgerring »

The AI job crisis is large tech employers firing workers to free up cash for AI capex, and those workers competing with everyone else in a competitive job market.

I’ve been unemployed and actively looking for a job for about 6 months, the longest stretch of active job searching I’ve ever done in my career. Several close friends who work in tech or tech-adjacent fields are in the same boat. Anecdata on Hacker News or LinkedIn tells the same story.

A chart showing “total number of jobs” is not meaningful. I took a temp job in a metal shop to make ends meet while I wait for the endless rounds of interviews I’ve now gone through with 4 companies. It pays less than half of what I was making before, and I am barely making ends meet. It’s not sustainable, even though the pay is more than fair for the work.

There are also a lot of job openings for home health care workers, or seasonal resort workers, that used to be filled by immigrants. Those jobs are not going to be taken by any of the engineers who just got laid off by Meta.

I have the strong impression that people who write articles like this are very disconnected from the reality of the economy right now, and that their curiosity ends at the line on the chart they cooked up to make a contrarian point.

Re: Where is the AI jobs crisis?

#230

Post by deadbabe »

rurp wrote: post #199
deadbabe wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The need for seniors isn’t going to “shoot through the roof” if they are using AI. If senior engineers are even 2x more productive with AI, then it’s like there are 2x as many senior engineers. Most likely, seniors will be 10x more productive in 5 years using AI. This outpaces the retirement rate. All the software engineers we need for the next 20-30 years are already in the current workforce. Only way juniors can ri…

> All the software engineers we need for the next 20-30 years are already in the current workforce. There's no way of knowing what the industry will look like decades from now. Even assuming the prediction that seniors become 10x more productive, that would mean software becomes much cheaper to produce. Does that induce enough demand for additional software that keeps employment levels high? Could be, who knows. Alte…

Ok so even less demand for software engineers? All the software engineers that the industry will ever need again have already been created?
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