I am an engineer and towards the end of my career, so seeing SW engineers struggling to find jobs is still shocking to me, We're using AI to analyze data sets right now, and coders are using it to augment code everywhere, but I think most of the people I work with have so many varied skills that we're years from being replaced yet.
Of course, you still need all of these skills to know how to interact with AI. And I would still encourage anyone to get an engineering degree, but it does seem like pure coders are starting to struggle to find jobs.
While there are new challenges, I do tend to sense an air of anti intellectualism in a lot of these articles about AI replacing highly skilled technical jobs. Get that engineering degree still, you're still much better off with it and it is still worth the cost. We have a shortage of tech workers in this country and that's not going to change quickly even if AI helps ease the shortage.
This discussion ends up being about trades too. "Learn to code" has been replaced by "learn a trade" on the Right. As if the trades haven't been harmed by the policies of the Right for generations now. My dad was a diemaker at a GM stamping plant for 40 years, it's a profession that provided us a good middle class life. But those same diemakers aren't doing as well as he did adjusted for inflation because of the Right's constant attacks on unions and workers. But no one asks, "OK, what if we have 5 million more electricians, plumbers, and HVAC people, what will become of those professions?" Well, they will pay an awful lot less for one thing. And they won't be any less back breaking.
I don't have the answers, no one does, but I am pretty sure the rich are going to share the spoils of AI with the rest of us.
= new reply since forum marked as read