IT Unemployment Rises to 5.7% as AI Hits Tech Jobs(wsj.com)
wsj.com
IT Unemployment Rises to 5.7% as AI Hits Tech Jobs
https://www.wsj.com/articles/it-unemployment-rises-to-5-7-as-ai-hits-tech-jobs-7726bb1b
149 comments
The financial and business press always invents causes to try to explain current events. Like you'll see an article that states "stocks fell today due to profit taking". In reality journalists have no clue why it happened and just make up something that sounds plausible or at least isn't objectively false.
I'm glad someone else recognizes the farce that is the implied cause-effect analysis of economic trends. "Stocks tumble as mywittyname avoids lunch time taco truck for fourth week in a row. Taco tariffs feared."
The accurate, but boring headline is almost always, "stock (tumble|gain) as algorithmic traders reinforce trend. Further news may occur."
The accurate, but boring headline is almost always, "stock (tumble|gain) as algorithmic traders reinforce trend. Further news may occur."
I'm pretty sure I've seen this pattern of "Stocks (tumble|gain) as X happened" but then 2 hours later if the stocks go in the other direction, there is a new headline "Stocks (tumble|gain) as X happened" where X remains the same, but tumble|gain got swapped.
I think I originally read that this happens in a book somewhere, then observed and noticed yeah that seems to be the norm. Not surprised it seems to be same thing in these adjacent metric % headlines where there's no proper thought if there exists a causal link between X and Y.
I think my brain has learned to recognize the pattern "Something rises X% as Thing Happened" and it reminds me of that cheeky quote about how every headline that is in the form of a question is, ... uh I forgot the full quote. But feels like almost this could have some kind of cheeky rule of its own, about how no causal link ever exists in a headline like this.
I think I originally read that this happens in a book somewhere, then observed and noticed yeah that seems to be the norm. Not surprised it seems to be same thing in these adjacent metric % headlines where there's no proper thought if there exists a causal link between X and Y.
I think my brain has learned to recognize the pattern "Something rises X% as Thing Happened" and it reminds me of that cheeky quote about how every headline that is in the form of a question is, ... uh I forgot the full quote. But feels like almost this could have some kind of cheeky rule of its own, about how no causal link ever exists in a headline like this.
> a book somewhere
Black Swan by Nassim Taleb?
Black Swan by Nassim Taleb?
I think not, because doesn't ring a bell at all. It was a book related to stock market though, IIRC it was a Canadian author who described their career as a day-trader and how they thought of how markets work. I wish I remembered better but it was quite long ago, and I don't have said book anymore. My book likely came out after that book, so maybe my author picked it up from others.
That book however you mentioned, I just looked it up and it seems interesting. Might put on my read list.
That book however you mentioned, I just looked it up and it seems interesting. Might put on my read list.
Michael Lewis wrote a ton on this topic. He's not Canadian, but his books are really good, if financial non-fiction is your thing. He wrote The Big Short, among others (Flash Boys is a good one).
More sellers than buyers.
Remember that a journalist is someone who sells your attention to advertisers, not someone who sells you an accurate picture of world events. It's far better for them to be wrong about something chaotic and unverifiable like the cause of a short term unemployment spike than to admit that they don't know. Sometimes it's better for them not to know the cause of something when it's mundane and they can bait you with the mystery, like the NJ drones that we all obsessed over for a month that turned out to be part of an R&D agreement that was a matter of public record and could have shot the whole story down on day one if it had been reported.
Actually, it's even more devious than that.
They use wording -- just like this article does -- like "X happens as Y also happens".
The keyword being "as" and not "because" or "due to".
It implies causality, by coupling both in the same title, without technically linking the two.
E.g. "Stocks fall as rate increase looms"
They're basically just saying two things happened at the same time, or one after the other, but one didn't necessarily cause the other.
IOW, they know they can't link the two -- i.e. they can't user words like "because" or "due to" -- but they also know that by coupling them in the same headline, readers will still infer causality.
They use wording -- just like this article does -- like "X happens as Y also happens".
The keyword being "as" and not "because" or "due to".
It implies causality, by coupling both in the same title, without technically linking the two.
E.g. "Stocks fall as rate increase looms"
They're basically just saying two things happened at the same time, or one after the other, but one didn't necessarily cause the other.
IOW, they know they can't link the two -- i.e. they can't user words like "because" or "due to" -- but they also know that by coupling them in the same headline, readers will still infer causality.
I have specifically noticed this pattern with the red-flag headline word “amid”. It always means the beta coeffficent is 0 but they want you to think it’s 1.
“President announces crackdown on immigration amid ongoing success of Taylor Swift’s new album”.
“President announces crackdown on immigration amid ongoing success of Taylor Swift’s new album”.
My partner and I make an informal hobby of tracking language like that which is designed to sneakily water down the strength of a headline. "Amid" rather than "because of" is a really good one. My personal favorite is "Reports: ". If you just preface your headline with that, you can say any old thing you want to and then later when pressed on the truth value of it you can retreat to the idea that you weren't reporting that as fact, you were reporting the fact that other people are saying it and you're not obligated to say who or how many or any other things that people might be saying. The practical upshot is that you as a journalist get to purposely induce people to believe something you know to be false but no one can technically call you a liar.
“We’re not sure what exactly is going on inside the town of Beaverton, Tom, but we’re reporting that there’s looting, raping and yes, even acts of cannibalism.”
“My God, you’ve actually seen people looting, raping and eating each other?”
“No, we haven’t actually seen it Tom, we’re just reporting it.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wCkchBXiaOE
“My God, you’ve actually seen people looting, raping and eating each other?”
“No, we haven’t actually seen it Tom, we’re just reporting it.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wCkchBXiaOE
This probably depends on how you define "IT". I think for employment type stats the list of categories is fairly wide, and can include almost anything that requires a computer that doesn't fit into other categories (which btw is often used for 'exempt' overtime status to put people in on-call rotations without resulting in an 'engaged to wait' scenario that requires payment for time not spent on a call. because they're "experts in IT related field").
But specifically this is probably mostly driven so far by tech support industries. "IT" being customer service reps who use a computer to respond to chat messages, in some cases.
Or actual tech support that's had its entire entry system stripped and replaced by an AI-guided walkthrough of predefined steps customers are required to take before they talk to a human. This will certainly have impact on the amount of support staff needed, even if a portion of that is simply frustrating customers into searching for answers themselves.
But specifically this is probably mostly driven so far by tech support industries. "IT" being customer service reps who use a computer to respond to chat messages, in some cases.
Or actual tech support that's had its entire entry system stripped and replaced by an AI-guided walkthrough of predefined steps customers are required to take before they talk to a human. This will certainly have impact on the amount of support staff needed, even if a portion of that is simply frustrating customers into searching for answers themselves.
> Or actual tech support that's had its entire entry system stripped and replaced by an AI-guided walkthrough of predefined steps customers are required to take before they talk to a human.
How much tech support was still in the US though? Outside of small onshore teams, frontline tech support for the major players was already all in India/SEA. You could replace those people with AI, yes, but it wouldn't reflect in US unemployment stats.
How much tech support was still in the US though? Outside of small onshore teams, frontline tech support for the major players was already all in India/SEA. You could replace those people with AI, yes, but it wouldn't reflect in US unemployment stats.
there are also internal IT teams at any corporation handling a decent amount of electronics for internal use. it's possible those are now getting thinned out with AI for the super mundane things like "my phone won't connect to the wi-fi."
More than you might think. There are many scenarios where US nationals are the only ones that can touch data.
They are replacing second tier people with people overseas who interact with chatbots and a limited number of staff in the US. So one dude can access customer data, but he’s servicing a dozen agents.
They are replacing second tier people with people overseas who interact with chatbots and a limited number of staff in the US. So one dude can access customer data, but he’s servicing a dozen agents.
According to the article, the overall unemployment rate is 4%. So something is happening with IT jobs, not the economy. I call it bullshit that it's the AI, it's the outsourcing/remote jobs
Companies overhired during the pandemic. Big companies hired people to deny their competitors employees.
Also as you flatten organizations and use cloud services you can discard lots of people. Every large company had a storage team. I worked for a big company that probably had 250 FTEs just running storage. Not anymore.
There’s also a ton of uncertainty in the US. Everyone is banking on a significant correction.
Also as you flatten organizations and use cloud services you can discard lots of people. Every large company had a storage team. I worked for a big company that probably had 250 FTEs just running storage. Not anymore.
There’s also a ton of uncertainty in the US. Everyone is banking on a significant correction.
I think it could be related. We purchased AI tools - with the new expectation - baked into weekly sprint deadlines that we will get 30% more work done.
But AI isn’t making you productive, corporate execs are using it as an excuse to understaff the company.
I didn't comment on our productivity or AI. Just the expectation :)
Oof. You got me.
Well if they have 10 people and were thinking about hiring 3 more, now they don't need to because they are 30% more productive. Productivity increases don't just cause people to be laid off. It means you can hire less.
Nice to hear that PMs are still making up deadlines based on vibes rather than real historical output whether it’s a human or AI.
... Yeah, but I mean that's just nonsense, and is not going to happen. People can expect all they want, but ultimately reality is reality.
Expectations can remain unreasonable longer than you can remain solvent.
Oh, yeah, I don’t doubt that it’ll have all sorts of unfortunate market effects, but ultimately it is _not a real thing_.
Man, if I had a nickel for when I got angry in a meeting (or with a spouse) over the exact same type of thing, and then ended up getting fired afterwards…. Or worse?
I’d have like a quarter. Which isn’t a lot. But man, you’d think I’d have learned by now huh?
Also, man do I understand Ye Wenjie from [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Three-Body_Problem_(nove...]. I don’t support, but holy shit do I understand.
Don’t get murdered pointlessly trying to do the right thing, eh? At least make it count for something useful. Try not to be dead right.
I’d have like a quarter. Which isn’t a lot. But man, you’d think I’d have learned by now huh?
Also, man do I understand Ye Wenjie from [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Three-Body_Problem_(nove...]. I don’t support, but holy shit do I understand.
Don’t get murdered pointlessly trying to do the right thing, eh? At least make it count for something useful. Try not to be dead right.
It is nonsense, but it does happen, and its enabled through the decoupling action of business decisions provided for by debt financing.
Reality is reality, and in the end you are right, but by that time it won't matter; the damage will have already been done. This is the nature of cascading failures, and delusion, and there are far more delusional people today in positions of power than ever before.
Edit: On a separate thing. As an FYI in case you didn't know, but it looks like your blog is now directing to a bad link on google, or they were hosting it and took your blog down.
Reality is reality, and in the end you are right, but by that time it won't matter; the damage will have already been done. This is the nature of cascading failures, and delusion, and there are far more delusional people today in positions of power than ever before.
Edit: On a separate thing. As an FYI in case you didn't know, but it looks like your blog is now directing to a bad link on google, or they were hosting it and took your blog down.
Oh, huh, yeah, used to be blogger, deleted it years back.
It is.
You would need to wait for several quarters' worth of labor market data and a thorough empirical analysis to see whether the hypothesis held up. 2-3 years would need to pass just to collect enough data.
"Another Reason"....
"Another reason for January’s tech job losses was that companies began implementing some intended spending cuts for this year, Janulaitis said, and many slashed budgets based on what the economy looked like during fiscal planning last year."
"Another reason for January’s tech job losses was that companies began implementing some intended spending cuts for this year, Janulaitis said, and many slashed budgets based on what the economy looked like during fiscal planning last year."
Exactly. I think there are many other factors influencing tech jobs.
All financial articles use what I call the "as"s reason.
It works like this. Find whatever is hot that day, week or month then put it after the "as".
Stock market down as Trump holds another signing. Stock market up big as Musk slashes government spending.
It works like this. Find whatever is hot that day, week or month then put it after the "as".
Stock market down as Trump holds another signing. Stock market up big as Musk slashes government spending.
I also started noticing this headline pattern ("something A as something B") all over the place a while ago and now automatically break it down as:
* Something A (probably) happened
* Something B (probably) happened
* The author/publisher are slimy weasels and I'm not going to give their stupid article any more time
* Something A (probably) happened
* Something B (probably) happened
* The author/publisher are slimy weasels and I'm not going to give their stupid article any more time
Exactly. Seems more likely that it's driven but much higher interest rates than AI. AI is likely just how these businesses are trying to justify why/how they've laid off more workers instead of asking the remaining people to do a lot more work for the same pay.
they think it is 'due to AI' because it helps push tech stocks; not due to any facts. I also recommend looking at this article's source (https://e-janco.com/career/employmentdata.html?srsltid=AfmBO...), apparently the Janco guys think its going to be be a better year for tech than last year. Trash journalism....
We don't. Economics is complex and it is extremely common for journalists to simply take something and run with it. Even just saying "unemployment" needs scrutiny, as there are multiple ways to measure "unemployment."
Yeah it's a bit early to see any impact from AI. In fact what I see is more hiring due to the scramble to build more products "now with AI!!!".
In our company we're not seeing any major impact on productivity yet and no jobs were lost. Yet.
In our company we're not seeing any major impact on productivity yet and no jobs were lost. Yet.
> How do we know that the rise in unemployment is being driven by AI specifically, and not by wider economic circumstances?.
There are several important things to look at that show this. First and foremost, IT has about a 40 year history now, with corresponding economic data.
In its entire history, its been uncorrelated with interest rates and other assets. These correlated assets are what most people refer to when they speak of wider economic circumstance. The IT industry is uncorrelated with this, with 40 years to back that up.
IT labor markets are however strongly correlated with advances in information technology. This correlation is found throughout that dataset as well, in both the boom and bust cycles.
The deep unemployment which we are seeing here, which doesn't include the first batch of laid off employees two years ago [18 mo], is only correlated and impacted by Information Technology advances.
There is only one such major advance that has been made in this time period... Artificial Intelligence.
AI has improved dramatically from a modular swappable design, and it can replace entry level positional tasks completely. It probably won't ever be able to take over the senior level positions, or the mid level positions, but that doesn't matter.
The companies involved in integrating these things into the production environment have mislead most of their customers, and in the process burnt all the bridges. Many of these companies market towards replacing workers with AI, grossly negligent of the whipsaw they are creating with that misleading narrative. In the short term they make lots of profit, while destroying the environment they need to sustain themselves.
By choking off the professional development pipeline which is a sequential pipeline in developing talent, this leaves few opportunities to progress to mid and senior level positions, which were few and far between to begin with.
When there is no economic incentive to go into any specialized field because AI has burnt the only bridge for a long-term career, people don't go into these jobs. Worse, those caught surprised by this change in circumstance, who actually have sufficient experience to perform at these mid-level ranges, may abandon the profession causing exponential brain drain. As anyone knows, people age and eventually die. Senior level people are at greater risk to this than others.
This inevitably creates a tsunami of cost in those irreplaceable positions which cannot be addressed by the market, and balloons far above what the market can bare. The forward looking expectations have made any labor in this industry worth less than AI services, and IT as a general rule is a labor multiplier where changes here eventually expand and infect everywhere.
Business is not constrained in hiring people because many business receive operations funding upfront from their financial engineering which often comes from money printers. By the time they notice the problem, it will be too late to solve it, in many respects its already too late because you have people who are incredibly competent, near geniuses, and they see no future in the industry and are retraining ahead of the curve.
AI threatens society because it disrupts the core pillars of society, which is indirect but immeasurably important to sustained organization of labor and food production. Agriculture is dependent on something like 64 different intermediate producers to maintain production levels sufficient to feed people.
Failures back to pre-modern industrial technology would mean half the people alive today starve to death, no matter how much they work.
These are the issues which the article doesn't really touch on correctly but its WSJ so what do you expect. Their journalism has never really been up to snuff.
There are several important things to look at that show this. First and foremost, IT has about a 40 year history now, with corresponding economic data.
In its entire history, its been uncorrelated with interest rates and other assets. These correlated assets are what most people refer to when they speak of wider economic circumstance. The IT industry is uncorrelated with this, with 40 years to back that up.
IT labor markets are however strongly correlated with advances in information technology. This correlation is found throughout that dataset as well, in both the boom and bust cycles.
The deep unemployment which we are seeing here, which doesn't include the first batch of laid off employees two years ago [18 mo], is only correlated and impacted by Information Technology advances.
There is only one such major advance that has been made in this time period... Artificial Intelligence.
AI has improved dramatically from a modular swappable design, and it can replace entry level positional tasks completely. It probably won't ever be able to take over the senior level positions, or the mid level positions, but that doesn't matter.
The companies involved in integrating these things into the production environment have mislead most of their customers, and in the process burnt all the bridges. Many of these companies market towards replacing workers with AI, grossly negligent of the whipsaw they are creating with that misleading narrative. In the short term they make lots of profit, while destroying the environment they need to sustain themselves.
By choking off the professional development pipeline which is a sequential pipeline in developing talent, this leaves few opportunities to progress to mid and senior level positions, which were few and far between to begin with.
When there is no economic incentive to go into any specialized field because AI has burnt the only bridge for a long-term career, people don't go into these jobs. Worse, those caught surprised by this change in circumstance, who actually have sufficient experience to perform at these mid-level ranges, may abandon the profession causing exponential brain drain. As anyone knows, people age and eventually die. Senior level people are at greater risk to this than others.
This inevitably creates a tsunami of cost in those irreplaceable positions which cannot be addressed by the market, and balloons far above what the market can bare. The forward looking expectations have made any labor in this industry worth less than AI services, and IT as a general rule is a labor multiplier where changes here eventually expand and infect everywhere.
Business is not constrained in hiring people because many business receive operations funding upfront from their financial engineering which often comes from money printers. By the time they notice the problem, it will be too late to solve it, in many respects its already too late because you have people who are incredibly competent, near geniuses, and they see no future in the industry and are retraining ahead of the curve.
AI threatens society because it disrupts the core pillars of society, which is indirect but immeasurably important to sustained organization of labor and food production. Agriculture is dependent on something like 64 different intermediate producers to maintain production levels sufficient to feed people.
Failures back to pre-modern industrial technology would mean half the people alive today starve to death, no matter how much they work.
These are the issues which the article doesn't really touch on correctly but its WSJ so what do you expect. Their journalism has never really been up to snuff.
> How do we know that the rise in unemployment is being driven by AI specifically, and not by wider economic circumstances?
It is right there, in the headline, sir. The economy is so good, like never before. /s
It is right there, in the headline, sir. The economy is so good, like never before. /s
Everyone has this wrong. They are replacing US jobs with jobs in Poland. I experienced this first hand.
I can confirm this. Former Senior Manager from Big Tech Co here (I just resigned 2 weeks ago). When I left, we were in the middle of offshoring all of my groups to Amsterdam. No stock compensation in Europe = cheaper devs. There was no real talk of replacing anyone with AI. We all used copilot and the other LLMs as tools, but you still needed devs who understood the systems and how to debug the generated code.
Can second this as a PM turned VC.
In Cybersecurity and DevTooling we've moved the entire Engineering and Product function to Israel, India, and Eastern Europe (Czechia, Poland, Romania).
We'll still fund founders in the US, but they still end up hiring in those countries instead because you can pay "Austin in 2010" salaries and get top tier talent.
20 years ago, P/L responsibility would remain in the US, but in the current iteration, even P/L stakeholders are now abroad.
In Cybersecurity and DevTooling we've moved the entire Engineering and Product function to Israel, India, and Eastern Europe (Czechia, Poland, Romania).
We'll still fund founders in the US, but they still end up hiring in those countries instead because you can pay "Austin in 2010" salaries and get top tier talent.
20 years ago, P/L responsibility would remain in the US, but in the current iteration, even P/L stakeholders are now abroad.
Thirding this, group manager at Microsoft. Throwaway as I post regularly under my professional account.
VPs have been explicit, in writing, that we are shifting heads to lower cost geos.
Hiring has been largely halted in the US for the bulk of non-business-critical roles to shift PCNs overseas, and there have been multiple waves of US focused layoffs to motivate this further.
While offshoring has been a topic for the last 20+ years of my career, this time, since 2022 or so, feels different even vs. prior recessions, and I expect we'll see continuing erosion in the quality of engineering positions and careers.
VPs have been explicit, in writing, that we are shifting heads to lower cost geos.
Hiring has been largely halted in the US for the bulk of non-business-critical roles to shift PCNs overseas, and there have been multiple waves of US focused layoffs to motivate this further.
While offshoring has been a topic for the last 20+ years of my career, this time, since 2022 or so, feels different even vs. prior recessions, and I expect we'll see continuing erosion in the quality of engineering positions and careers.
It’s hard to know if this most recent move will be more permanent. The irony with Amsterdam was that they had a hell of a time hiring. They had to import 80-90% of their labor from Eastern Europe or elsewhere and everyone had visa issues and would take 2-4 months to start. I also think the company will get a rude awakening in a few years when they realize they can’t just fire everyone or do layoffs like they were in the US.
Some of the pessimism comes in that I've seen larger "centers of gravity" being built in these regions with full reporting chains vs. effectively being the offshore wing of another team, as well as commensurately higher levels of product ownership and growth or traction over the last few years.
Additionally, can obviously only speak for myself but I've tended to see more hiring in countries without the strong european worker protections (eastern Europe, Israel, india, asia)
Additionally, can obviously only speak for myself but I've tended to see more hiring in countries without the strong european worker protections (eastern Europe, Israel, india, asia)
I created an account specifically to reply to this comment.
I am the Romanian that Engineering got outsourced to. Year 2 of college, first job ever.
I feel bad in a way, considering that I probably stole some other engineer's job simply because I am cheaper.
It's a moral problem I hadn't(or rather, didn't want to) consider before reading this comment thread.
I love the people I work with(both overseas and local), but comments like these make me wonder if I've made the wrong choice.
I feel bad in a way, considering that I probably stole some other engineer's job simply because I am cheaper.
It's a moral problem I hadn't(or rather, didn't want to) consider before reading this comment thread.
I love the people I work with(both overseas and local), but comments like these make me wonder if I've made the wrong choice.
The American dev you may have impacted has probably been automating away someone else’s job(s) for years. This is just how business works and I wouldn’t feel bad about it at all. Qualified people will land on their feet.
> It's a moral problem I hadn't(or rather, didn't want to) consider before reading this comment thread
> I love the people I work with(both overseas and local), but comments like these make me wonder if I've made the wrong choice
It's out of your control as an IC. That said, do whatever you can to prepare for the worst.
Your a competent engineer, just like anyone else in any other country.
> I love the people I work with(both overseas and local), but comments like these make me wonder if I've made the wrong choice
It's out of your control as an IC. That said, do whatever you can to prepare for the worst.
Your a competent engineer, just like anyone else in any other country.
As an American impacted by this, I can at least personally say that if anything the fact that you got a job is one of the few upsides in all this.
I don't begrudge a romanian SWE any more than a US one, we're all just trying to get by here, and the fact that global megacorps can do currency/economy arbitrage that they prevent workers from benefiting from while ensuring they have every advantage is by and large not your fault.
It should have been for us as engineers to organize, unionize, or legislate protections if we didn't want this to happen, and despite advocating this to my peers during the boom years, I was constantly rebuffed.
Obviously I put more on the massive companies with the power to dictate global laws and trade practices gleefully jumping at this, but between that and the responsibility I put on my peers/myself to fight against that, I certainly don't put blame on you.
I don't begrudge a romanian SWE any more than a US one, we're all just trying to get by here, and the fact that global megacorps can do currency/economy arbitrage that they prevent workers from benefiting from while ensuring they have every advantage is by and large not your fault.
It should have been for us as engineers to organize, unionize, or legislate protections if we didn't want this to happen, and despite advocating this to my peers during the boom years, I was constantly rebuffed.
Obviously I put more on the massive companies with the power to dictate global laws and trade practices gleefully jumping at this, but between that and the responsibility I put on my peers/myself to fight against that, I certainly don't put blame on you.
I don't think you should feel bad. It's a bit like feeling guilty because it's raining where you are while somewhere else in the world people are suffering a famine due to lack of rainfall.
The only difference is that you have zero control over the weather and very nearly zero control over corporate hiring decisions.
The only difference is that you have zero control over the weather and very nearly zero control over corporate hiring decisions.
This. Every big company I know of is offshoring to India and Eastern Europe currently. It has nothing to do with AI.
This has been occurring for a while, no? Half of my team at an old job was in Romania.
After the pandemic, P&L leadership functions moved abroad as well.
A lot of mid-level management on visas were laid off during 2020-21 during the depth of COVID, and this had to return.
Now, the SVP for a core Engineering Org or your PM Director owning an entire BU might be in Bangalore, Tel Aviv, or Cluj.
If ICs to mid/upper level leadership are in the foreign office, it doesn't make as much sense to keep hiring domestically for Product or Engineering roles.
A lot of mid-level management on visas were laid off during 2020-21 during the depth of COVID, and this had to return.
Now, the SVP for a core Engineering Org or your PM Director owning an entire BU might be in Bangalore, Tel Aviv, or Cluj.
If ICs to mid/upper level leadership are in the foreign office, it doesn't make as much sense to keep hiring domestically for Product or Engineering roles.
used to do early calls with my QA team in Croatia. Nice folks.
But that is not new. Tech always had overseas sweatshops. India, Latin America, Eastern Europe come to mind.
This is true but it had not exploded at rates like this until 2022ish. Since 2000 the fed interest rate was effectively 0 until now. This is causing companies to cut every corner they can, which is causing no employment here, and 100% employment abroad.
https://www.macrotrends.net/2015/fed-funds-rate-historical-c...
Not true at all. We are in the same regime as the pre 2008 rate response. We are below the late 90s boom times.
So you’d need some other explanation other than bare rates.
Not true at all. We are in the same regime as the pre 2008 rate response. We are below the late 90s boom times.
So you’d need some other explanation other than bare rates.
Infrastructure for internet access, education in programming, and a lot of other things were NOT there in other countries in 2008-2012
The thing the WFH proponents didn't understand was that it showed management if you can do your job remotely, Andrzej can do it from Kraków.
I think WFH should stand for Where's Fucking Housing because that's like 90% of the "WFH crowd"'s motivation from what I've seen - since companies almost never pay enough to live near enough to their office. If they did, then the price differential between US and overseas would be even worse..
Good. So earlier, you had a good well-paying job but no good housing. Now you have neither. Sigh.
I love your take on WFH!
/s
You see, it’s of critical importance that Santa Clara valley retain the character of a quaint mid 1960s town of single level shops and tract houses. Where jimmy can ride his Big Wheel in the Cul De Sac.
You see, it’s of critical importance that Santa Clara valley retain the character of a quaint mid 1960s town of single level shops and tract houses. Where jimmy can ride his Big Wheel in the Cul De Sac.
> Tech always had overseas sweatshops. India, Latin America, Eastern Europe come to mind
But back then, the Engineering Manager or Product Manager would remain in the US.
Now even Engineering and Product leadership is being outsourced as well, which makes it easier to enforce standards.
But back then, the Engineering Manager or Product Manager would remain in the US.
Now even Engineering and Product leadership is being outsourced as well, which makes it easier to enforce standards.
How does it make it easier to enforce standards when everyone involved is able to collude easier?
That was not my experience, having worked through 2 other bust cycles, everyone said the same things through those as well.
As I mentioned in my comment, during previous boom-bust cycle, the leadership that had P/L responsibilities (Engineering Leadership, Group/Directors PM) would remain in the US.
But after the COVID layoffs happened, impacted H1B, EB1/2, and O1 visa holders returned to their home countries, and then got rehired by the same employers but for $60k-130k TC (depending on country).
A lot of mid-late career product and engineering leadership was laid of in 2020-21, and those guys have now founded the new generation of foreign offices.
But after the COVID layoffs happened, impacted H1B, EB1/2, and O1 visa holders returned to their home countries, and then got rehired by the same employers but for $60k-130k TC (depending on country).
A lot of mid-late career product and engineering leadership was laid of in 2020-21, and those guys have now founded the new generation of foreign offices.
I think that businesses are emboldened now because they believe AI will bridge the gap that couldn't be bridge in the last great offshoring.
What gap? People all around the world can speak English, and write code. The US didn't need AI to push all manufacturing to China. You're getting outsourced. This is normally where unions step in, but not in this country.
You just pointed out all manufacturing migrated to China. Unions couldn't stop it (they probably accelerated it). So what would an IT union do?
The gap between experience, domain knowledge, and legacy knowledge. If you've ever worked in a large org that has been running for a few years these can be significant gaps and they are usually filled by having access to someone in the office to answer questions.
Work ethic and trust culture are big ones as well. Though admittedly some leaders love the "yes boss" vibe of overseas devs, even if they are lying to your face.
It's a cycle.
The US is expensive, so offshore. Offshore projects are more expensive because they never work, so come back to the US.
I've lived it twice now. We’re in the middle of my third cycle.
The US is expensive, so offshore. Offshore projects are more expensive because they never work, so come back to the US.
I've lived it twice now. We’re in the middle of my third cycle.
Expect this cycle to be perm. The infrastructure, education and language barriers are completely gone now. This is my third cycle too, and its different this time.
In 2006 the Indians would randomly cut out, couldn't be on video (phone only) and had major language barriers, and they would join in their evening.
Now in 2024 you're on their schedule. Believe me, those people are not staying up late for your 3pm call. Wake up at 5am every day to keep your job, you have 3-4 hours to work with them.
In 2006 the Indians would randomly cut out, couldn't be on video (phone only) and had major language barriers, and they would join in their evening.
Now in 2024 you're on their schedule. Believe me, those people are not staying up late for your 3pm call. Wake up at 5am every day to keep your job, you have 3-4 hours to work with them.
Honestly to biggest issues I've had with overseas devs and managers (mostly India) is the lying and misrepresenting which is cultural.
Honestly the biggest issue is time difference. If US corpos were strategic they would have invested in Latin America and build huge talent pools there.
Same time zone, same culture same holidays, same language with big portion of the US population.
Last go around my client used Brazil. Worked for a while until there was a major system outage and it turned out they didn't have the skill set to actually solve any problems.
What I'm seeing is that previous off shoring was mostly done with contract orgs. I'm seeing direct hiring this time. I guess for more control.
This will still fail I think, for the same reason contracting did.
The churn is real and any offshoring hotbed ends up with a lot of competing between big companies for talent which then drives the prices up and motivates people to jump companies more.
The churn is real and any offshoring hotbed ends up with a lot of competing between big companies for talent which then drives the prices up and motivates people to jump companies more.
The issues we saw were more about quality. I know churn is bad for that, but I think the problem was more related to lack of oversight and vetting. This might improve that, but I'd probably bet against it.
The difference is that they no longer are "outsourced" sweatshops. They are just entire divisions/departments of companies with full reporting chains. Effectively interchangeable with a US remote WFH employee/department.
I've been employing eastern European IT folks since the early 00's as I've founded/worked for remote only companies since the late 90's. We were ahead of the game here, and anyone we hired was not treated like a sweatshop worker. They were hired and promoted like any hire we made in the US and were simply called an employee. The talent level was same or better than the US talent level for 1/10th of the cost, especially at the mid-tier/career level.
The largest issue was timezones, but if you needed to staff a 24x7 highly skilled ops team - this was one effective way to get a great head start doing so. Plus it was relatively easy getting folks to work odd hours if you were paying double local salaries.
Since the pandemic things have entirely shifted. It used to be large companies/enterprises would offshore to sweatshop style outsourcing companies. They had a hard time competing with us since the work and responsibility simply did not attract the best candidates. We could hire directly out of local university pipelines and be extremely picky in only taking the top 1% of candidates due to this. After the pandemic this totally changed to these large companies now competing on salary at levels we no longer found competitive. We simply no longer enjoy the strategic advantage of having an untapped low-cost highly skilled labor pool in these areas any longer. Large companies have more or less adopted our model.
It's now not uncommon to have entire teams headed up by a highly competent senior VP or C level local leader who reports directly to US upper level management. They are included in all business decisions as anyone in the US would be at their level, and performance is similar to any US team.
I have always (and even written a few times on HN about the subject) thought highly compensated US engineers were being exceedingly short-sighted in their demands for WFO since this was always going to be the outcome in the end. Once you can hire someone in the midwest US, it's not really a huge leap to realizing you can do the same 2500 miles away in a low cost country. There are still tons of labor arbitrage opportunities left in the world and the story that there is no local technical talent in these places is utterly false. It's always been a management problem.
Over time it will even out - and it has quite a bit. Salaries are now maybe 1/3 to 1/2 US salaries at the same talent level, so it still has a long way to go in my opinion. You are only seeing the start of many companies building up long-term strategic plans in these regions - these things take years to decades to be fully realized.
Most US WFH engineers will be competing on salary/skillsets in a world market within their lifetimes regardless of cost of living differences. The writing is on the wall, and I personally believe the die has been cast at this point.
I've been employing eastern European IT folks since the early 00's as I've founded/worked for remote only companies since the late 90's. We were ahead of the game here, and anyone we hired was not treated like a sweatshop worker. They were hired and promoted like any hire we made in the US and were simply called an employee. The talent level was same or better than the US talent level for 1/10th of the cost, especially at the mid-tier/career level.
The largest issue was timezones, but if you needed to staff a 24x7 highly skilled ops team - this was one effective way to get a great head start doing so. Plus it was relatively easy getting folks to work odd hours if you were paying double local salaries.
Since the pandemic things have entirely shifted. It used to be large companies/enterprises would offshore to sweatshop style outsourcing companies. They had a hard time competing with us since the work and responsibility simply did not attract the best candidates. We could hire directly out of local university pipelines and be extremely picky in only taking the top 1% of candidates due to this. After the pandemic this totally changed to these large companies now competing on salary at levels we no longer found competitive. We simply no longer enjoy the strategic advantage of having an untapped low-cost highly skilled labor pool in these areas any longer. Large companies have more or less adopted our model.
It's now not uncommon to have entire teams headed up by a highly competent senior VP or C level local leader who reports directly to US upper level management. They are included in all business decisions as anyone in the US would be at their level, and performance is similar to any US team.
I have always (and even written a few times on HN about the subject) thought highly compensated US engineers were being exceedingly short-sighted in their demands for WFO since this was always going to be the outcome in the end. Once you can hire someone in the midwest US, it's not really a huge leap to realizing you can do the same 2500 miles away in a low cost country. There are still tons of labor arbitrage opportunities left in the world and the story that there is no local technical talent in these places is utterly false. It's always been a management problem.
Over time it will even out - and it has quite a bit. Salaries are now maybe 1/3 to 1/2 US salaries at the same talent level, so it still has a long way to go in my opinion. You are only seeing the start of many companies building up long-term strategic plans in these regions - these things take years to decades to be fully realized.
Most US WFH engineers will be competing on salary/skillsets in a world market within their lifetimes regardless of cost of living differences. The writing is on the wall, and I personally believe the die has been cast at this point.
Well, in that case U.S. Engineers should cheer for a weaker dollar, since it would bring the U.S. salaries more in line with the salaries in the rest of the world without affecting local dynamics as much (and still allowing people to afford their mortgages) :)
It seems probable that the trend has accelerated.
> They are replacing US jobs with jobs in Poland. I experienced this first hand.
Like, only now?! This had been the case my entire career to the point I got fed up of rat race to the delight of foreign superior, became cynical and unemployable. It's not ey-ay, nor outsourcing, it's the economay. We have a crisis, sir.
Like, only now?! This had been the case my entire career to the point I got fed up of rat race to the delight of foreign superior, became cynical and unemployable. It's not ey-ay, nor outsourcing, it's the economay. We have a crisis, sir.
Same. We lost everyone in US office due to attrition and never hired anyone to replace. Now all the development is done in Poland.
Small org, no low-performers, no layoffs. Same result as everywhere else.
Small org, no low-performers, no layoffs. Same result as everywhere else.
I have been saying this since 2021 (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27696235, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29784222)
This was totally predictable. If your job can be shipped to Kansas from SV because it is cheaper, it won't be too long before it is shipped to Canada which cheaper than Kansas and then to Colombia.
But HN is still embracing remote work. I hope those in the US/Western Europe wake up soon otherwise all the coding jobs will go the way of manufacturing jobs very soon - either done by robots or done by cheaper labor in Asia or Africa or LatAm.
This was totally predictable. If your job can be shipped to Kansas from SV because it is cheaper, it won't be too long before it is shipped to Canada which cheaper than Kansas and then to Colombia.
But HN is still embracing remote work. I hope those in the US/Western Europe wake up soon otherwise all the coding jobs will go the way of manufacturing jobs very soon - either done by robots or done by cheaper labor in Asia or Africa or LatAm.
I haven’t experienced it, yet, but for my company it might be one of two ways it becomes profitable. The other way is to lay everyone off AND offshore work only when the lone remainer needs help.
And Mexico City, Brazil, India, etc etc.
If Putin gets what he really wants that is going to work out as great as it did for all the companies outsourcing to Ukraine.
Putin is covertly manipulating Poland with the same games as he did with Ukraine. And now it appears increasingly likely he has the right guy in the white house to take what he wants.
Putin is covertly manipulating Poland with the same games as he did with Ukraine. And now it appears increasingly likely he has the right guy in the white house to take what he wants.
Some big companies already moved when war started. I know one major bank moved cca 1,500 IT & support jobs (as in the people doing them, often with families) to Prague, I think mostly from Kyiv.
Great place for talent, pretty horrible for salaries and its going to get worse (from employer's perspective just to be clear, all the power to you guys there... I've lived 5 years in that city and if you are into European cities and city life in general and don't mind having mountains far this one is nice).
Great place for talent, pretty horrible for salaries and its going to get worse (from employer's perspective just to be clear, all the power to you guys there... I've lived 5 years in that city and if you are into European cities and city life in general and don't mind having mountains far this one is nice).
Ukrainian companies can just move to Poland. There's a lot of Ukrainian IT workers here already, and since long before the war started. Putin isn't manipulating Poland, and a full-scale invasion isn't "games". What is this nonsense.
Another lackluster article with a number of assertions with AI in the headline to drive clicks.
From the article...
> "Jobs are being eliminated within the IT function which are routine and mundane, such as reporting, clerical administration,” Janulaitis said. “As they start looking at AI, they’re also looking at reducing the number of programmers, systems designers, hoping that AI is going to be able to provide them some value and have a good rate of return.”
Hoping... - I think this is where "leaders" are showcasing their ignorance. They're being sold a bill of goods that, truly, doesn't exist at the levels they think it does.
Now, on the flip side, the first part of the paragraph above seems plausible. However, these mundane tasks have been able to have been automated for a long time. It's just that it wasn't en vogue.
Reducing the roles outlined will truly lead to shittier outcomes for these companies and I hope the ones that are diving head first end up paying the price as it showcases, not their efficiencies but their ignorance.
AI has a few great use cases. Replacing IT folks who are skilled and can think on their feet are not a prime target for AI.
From the article...
> "Jobs are being eliminated within the IT function which are routine and mundane, such as reporting, clerical administration,” Janulaitis said. “As they start looking at AI, they’re also looking at reducing the number of programmers, systems designers, hoping that AI is going to be able to provide them some value and have a good rate of return.”
Hoping... - I think this is where "leaders" are showcasing their ignorance. They're being sold a bill of goods that, truly, doesn't exist at the levels they think it does.
Now, on the flip side, the first part of the paragraph above seems plausible. However, these mundane tasks have been able to have been automated for a long time. It's just that it wasn't en vogue.
Reducing the roles outlined will truly lead to shittier outcomes for these companies and I hope the ones that are diving head first end up paying the price as it showcases, not their efficiencies but their ignorance.
AI has a few great use cases. Replacing IT folks who are skilled and can think on their feet are not a prime target for AI.
AI is a tool not a worker, you still need people to wield the hammer. Especially because hallucinations could seriously cost you.
Like any new productivity tool, the people in charge of money are hoping that it makes people so much more productive that they can have one person do the job of several
This still does replace workers in the end. It doesn't really matter if you lose your job to an autonomous AI or you lose your job because someone else is using an AI to do your job and theirs
I don't personally believe AI makes people this much more productive, but clearly people in charge of headcount are thinking it is
This still does replace workers in the end. It doesn't really matter if you lose your job to an autonomous AI or you lose your job because someone else is using an AI to do your job and theirs
I don't personally believe AI makes people this much more productive, but clearly people in charge of headcount are thinking it is
Which is really funny because a lot of the times businesses don't adopt new programming frameworks until the rest of the industry has tried and tested it, but it seems people are treating AI like if its a worker, when its closer to Adderall for developers if used right.
It has nothing to do with AI, and everything to do with an oversaturated market and over-employment. AI is just an excuse.
I doubt AI has much to do with it. But it may be given as "excuse" by CXOs to explain why the cuts have been made.
To add AI functionality, you will first need more developers, and a different kind (those that can train/evaluate/improve/deploy/integrate AI models) before potential savings can be kicking in. Some payback that may lead to layoffs could happen, but with a delay. It would be very silly to lay off a good developer rather than re-assign them, because the cost of hiring them is enormous, and you may not get the same quality again; in economic terminology, software engineers are "non-fungible resources".
To add AI functionality, you will first need more developers, and a different kind (those that can train/evaluate/improve/deploy/integrate AI models) before potential savings can be kicking in. Some payback that may lead to layoffs could happen, but with a delay. It would be very silly to lay off a good developer rather than re-assign them, because the cost of hiring them is enormous, and you may not get the same quality again; in economic terminology, software engineers are "non-fungible resources".
AI isn't hitting tech jobs, management is.
I would more specifically label it as capitalism and its general brutality is hitting it
Unemployment and under-employment are not unique to capitalism.
No but it’s clearly capitalist pressures in this instance
I thought "we gonna have uuuge success, many-many jobs, we gonna need many-many people, a lot of people"
you think the president can turn the economy around in 1 month?
jobs are leaving the US and going overseas. even h1b engineers here are treated like dogs because what are they going to do? complain and get sent home? no. they'll work weekends, and 12 hours days, sure.
and before you say this is false I've seen it firsthand many times. personally seen it with my eyes.
and before you say this is false I've seen it firsthand many times. personally seen it with my eyes.
I think the actual story here is big corporations are laying off people to invest more in AI, rather than "replacing" programmers with AI.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/jackkelly/2025/02/02/google-off...
https://www.forbes.com/sites/esatdedezade/2025/02/10/meta-jo...
https://www.forbes.com/sites/jackkelly/2025/02/02/google-off...
https://www.forbes.com/sites/esatdedezade/2025/02/10/meta-jo...
AI = aggressively offshoring jobs as fast as humanly possible.
Having tried to get AI to do some of my coding work for me, I’m not convinced AI is the real culprit. I think this has much more to do with the end of ZIRP.
The irony is that AI, as a replacement for an even average programmer, doesn’t work. You can use it helpfully if you are already a programmer, but if you’re not, you won’t know when it’s generating insecure or even non-working code.
And yet it’s causing massive disruption. The bosses have such a hardon for layoffs that they’re doing this on the slim chance that it might work for them. Having to hire programmers back in a panic is, as they see it, future someone else’s problem.
And yet it’s causing massive disruption. The bosses have such a hardon for layoffs that they’re doing this on the slim chance that it might work for them. Having to hire programmers back in a panic is, as they see it, future someone else’s problem.
I'm oversimplifying it horrendously with dumb math, but this is how I think of it:
Let's say you're trying to build a product/feature. You have general timelines for the launch. About 5 years ago, it would take a team of 10 to deliver it. Now, let's assume there were productivity gains, and you can deliver it with a team of 8.
This would not necessarily be a problem if for 20% of the workforce cut, you would also start getting investments and create 20% more companies/features. The big uncertainty is, will this ever happen, or it'll end up with 10% increment in such activities, so you still have that extra person hanging around.
Let's say you're trying to build a product/feature. You have general timelines for the launch. About 5 years ago, it would take a team of 10 to deliver it. Now, let's assume there were productivity gains, and you can deliver it with a team of 8.
This would not necessarily be a problem if for 20% of the workforce cut, you would also start getting investments and create 20% more companies/features. The big uncertainty is, will this ever happen, or it'll end up with 10% increment in such activities, so you still have that extra person hanging around.
That's absolutely true, but it doesn't mean AI won't lead to job losses just in terms of increased productivity: if your existing programmers can get more done you may find yourself reducing (or at least freezing) your team size.
I continue to hope that the net result of programmers getting more productive is an increase in demand for our skills, as employers realize they can get a whole lot more value for their investment. It might take a while for that to shake out though - we need companies to realize they can take on more ambitious projects now.
I continue to hope that the net result of programmers getting more productive is an increase in demand for our skills, as employers realize they can get a whole lot more value for their investment. It might take a while for that to shake out though - we need companies to realize they can take on more ambitious projects now.
100% C suite executives are not going to sit in front of a chat agent to fix a bug in an application or solve a problem.
Managers would do what they always do. Give somebody requirements. Just in this case it's "something"
Managers give very loosey-goosey, easy to misinterpret requirements.
Which the AI will just make a stab at without digging in and asking clarifying questions or examining all aspects of the codebase to spot what challenges there are with doing it that way with the specific custom business logic needs needed for the rest of the application, and then get it very wrong and not anywhere close to what was intended (although possibly exactly what was actually asked for).
Meanwhile even a slightly seasoned developer will know to ask for clarifying questions on various aspects of it, or point out challenges with the existing codebase to match the requested requirements (sometimes after taking a stab at it themselves and realizing it doesn't work).
There are ways to prompt the AI to produce better results, with very specific and detailed requirements that include tricky aspects of the technology (that developers are aware of and can provide when they write prompts), but the typical requirements that come down from management ain't anywhere near that.
Not saying AI won't ever get to that point, but we're not there yet.
Which the AI will just make a stab at without digging in and asking clarifying questions or examining all aspects of the codebase to spot what challenges there are with doing it that way with the specific custom business logic needs needed for the rest of the application, and then get it very wrong and not anywhere close to what was intended (although possibly exactly what was actually asked for).
Meanwhile even a slightly seasoned developer will know to ask for clarifying questions on various aspects of it, or point out challenges with the existing codebase to match the requested requirements (sometimes after taking a stab at it themselves and realizing it doesn't work).
There are ways to prompt the AI to produce better results, with very specific and detailed requirements that include tricky aspects of the technology (that developers are aware of and can provide when they write prompts), but the typical requirements that come down from management ain't anywhere near that.
Not saying AI won't ever get to that point, but we're not there yet.
Being helpful to 2/3 might be enough to lay off 1/3
The only change this quarter is the use of AI to justify this behavior :)
> The irony is that AI, as a replacement for an even average programmer, doesn’t work.
Yet.
Yet.
AI needs to fundamentally change before this happens. We're not even close to capturing actual reasoning in AI models.
Disagree. I've been coding with o1 and o3-mini-high
If you give it a prompt which resembles a requirements document produced by a competent manager, you will get what you request and it will run first time.
If you give it a prompt which resembles a requirements document produced by a competent manager, you will get what you request and it will run first time.
I think you overestimate how many people could produce this document to the degree you're talking about
Doesn't matter how many people can produce the requirements document when an AI can produce it.
No manager and coder pair can iterate on an idea 5 times per minute, even if the first attempt needs correction, the timescale disparity makes AI agents appealing for nearly all noncritical coding tasks.
No manager and coder pair can iterate on an idea 5 times per minute, even if the first attempt needs correction, the timescale disparity makes AI agents appealing for nearly all noncritical coding tasks.
Now you're talking about someone who can describe what they want in enough so that an AI can generate a strictly defined requirements document with enough detail that another AI (or the same AI) can generate working code?
It's just AI all the way down, and each step still needs to be validated because AI is not reliable
It's just AI all the way down, and each step still needs to be validated because AI is not reliable
What about examples where [technical] management actively makes it harder for engineers to do their job by enforcing nonsensical design decisions (when explicitly warned against it)? :)
No AI can solve that one.
No AI can solve that one.
Not sure I agree here completely. On its own perhaps not, but if AI is able to deliver nonsensical design decisions at a faster rate than a human, you can iterate to a final better design faster.
lol. The hardest part in corp programming is getting the requirements right when literally no one involved can seem to think themselves out of a paper bag.
It isn’t a matter of iterating either, it’s being able to figure out what is politically workable and actually implementable.
It isn’t a matter of iterating either, it’s being able to figure out what is politically workable and actually implementable.
Maybe. But if one founder and a couple of good devs can handle the requirements and management, and handhold the agents when needed to make a product 80% as good as a competitor with 200 employees, it's still gg for that competitor.
Do you have a chat example you can share where you found it to work great? I feel that the performance varies a lot between domains.
And how many C suite executives will be doing this?
What language?
I used to pick new languages when I started projects with AI for learning but lately I've been using ruby for everything possible and I generally prefer it's output as it writes stuff more idiomatically than I do (out of laziness)
Ah, I was curious if o1 is running code in background and doing an error loop.
It's irrelevant anyway, because AI companies are not HR firms. They don't get rich by lowering the cost of labor, nobody in tech does. They get rich by implementing the IBM/Oracle/Salesforce model for enterprise B2B: selling a "platform" with plenty of "smart plugins", which will require plenty of humans to sit in on meetings, write technical requirements, do QA and the usual stuff that pushes IT costs way past budget.
I realize that I'm beating a dead horse here but .. how can a story about two widely relevant topics -- the way AI is accelerating automation and the way that impacts employment all over the world -- be considered credible let worth sharing when it's based on someone just two (maybe three) sources -- from one employment agency when there are thousands in the US alone, and one analyst with just about zero footprint in the news sources I use or even come across?
No diss to the OP, but is there any point to sharing posts like this?
1) the headline is bait for a story content that's at best inconclusive, 2) of the two sources for this story, one analyst's point that IT spending on AI outpaced new hires seems to do most of the post's heavy lifting, 3) the second source -- an Indeed economist -- makes almost the opposite point that after increased spending on AI at the expense of new hires, spending on the is stabilizing 4) And this entire story appears to be based on *one month's worth of job reporting*
I understand why a WSJ reported is professionally required to spin something out of a nothingburger and convert attention into ad impressions and "provoke debate" or whatever, but for those of us uninterested in WSJ or Rupert Murdoch's success this feels as unhelpful as that post from a week or so ago about yet another (inconclusive A.F.) study on the effects of marijuanablahblahblah ...
1) the headline is bait for a story content that's at best inconclusive, 2) of the two sources for this story, one analyst's point that IT spending on AI outpaced new hires seems to do most of the post's heavy lifting, 3) the second source -- an Indeed economist -- makes almost the opposite point that after increased spending on AI at the expense of new hires, spending on the is stabilizing 4) And this entire story appears to be based on *one month's worth of job reporting*
I understand why a WSJ reported is professionally required to spin something out of a nothingburger and convert attention into ad impressions and "provoke debate" or whatever, but for those of us uninterested in WSJ or Rupert Murdoch's success this feels as unhelpful as that post from a week or so ago about yet another (inconclusive A.F.) study on the effects of marijuanablahblahblah ...
Current US UR is just above 4%. 1.7% Delta. Stay tuned to see if the gap widens in this particular sector at a faster rate than others.
AI accelerated the process, of IT headcount doing down, multiplied by outsourcing etc
[deleted]
The silver lining is at least some jobs will have to exist to solve the problems caused by hallucinations
Seems more like people are leaving out of fear more than getting laid off over this.
H1B has surely nothing to do with this.
The article's evidence for the AI claim is just "some guy you've never heard of says so".