On AI doomerism

I don’t want to say I hate it, because that’s too strong of a sentiment and tbh I care very little about this, but AI doomerism is… tiring. Ok, I think I found the right adjective. Tiring.

You can’t scroll a few posts on Twitter or a few comments on YouTube until you find that person that says something along the lines of:

• why bother, AI is going to do everything
• AI will replace programmers
• AI already took our jobs
• when (enter something that will never happen), then we’ll all be without a job
• …and other doomerism like this, even if OpenAI founder himself says “lower your expectations 100x”.

I have so much to unpack here.

First, there’s a lot of people, and I mean a LOT, that went into programming and didn’t have a genuine passion for the job. For them, it’s just a way to make money. They heard programmers are paid a lot (they were, and they still are, depending on where you live), they have a quite comfortably day (sitting on comfy chairs in heated offices, or even working from home), some even work remotely as digital nomads, very cool.

Very few jobs out there give those kind of perks: high pay and comfortable life. Many high paying jobs are highly paid because of harsh conditions. Or high requirements, for example specific degrees.

Becoming a programmer is one of the few highly paid professions where anyone, and I mean anyone, can start at any point in their life, and just by learning the trade, they can become one.

And generally, screwing up is not a super tragic event like a civil engineer wrongly calculating a bridge structural requirement. Similarly, you can’t become a doctor by practicing surgery by trial and error. But with software engineering, that’s quite a normal path for many.

I personally studied Computer Engineering, and before that I went to a technical high school that was all about computers and programming. So I have a quote and quote traditional education.

But so many talented people out there just studied different stuff, then discovered their passion for programming later in life.

It’s super cool, and those that have the passion, it really shows.

To them, those people that care about the craft, AI is not a problem at all.

But to those that just randomly jumped into programming because they heard some friend got a new job that paid double theirs, right after a bootcamp, and were in just for the money and the job (and I repeat, nothing wrong with that), if there are no jobs any more due to AI (it’s not just AI, but AI doomerism makes you think that), then they might as well just move to a different field where jobs are abundant. I don’t know what field does that, but almost everyone has a job, so other jobs exist. Don’t ask me, because I’ve always been a programmer, except when back in school I worked in kitchens in a really fancy mountain resort town to make some extra money during the summers.

The “voice” going around is that the “gold rush” is over (it is), and that there are no jobs anymore.

Why is that?

I think a few different reasons, all combined:

1. post-COVID companies hired like crazy. Digital transformation, remote work, the e-commerce boom, increased tech adoption, innovation, and competition. This led to overstaffing, and aggressive downsizing thereafter.
2. the economic slowdown and stagnation and the end of the zero-interest rate period
3. increased competition due to mental and cultural unlocking of remote work. If your company found out you can work remotely from your house, then your company might as well hire from overseas paying developers 5 or 10 times less
4. investor pressure: almost all companies are VC backed or have investors in other forms, including (or especially) FAANG companies. The trend is to cut expenses, and start reaching profitability. If a single Silicon Valley based developer costs them $300,000/y, firing 1000 developers that they found unnecessary means $300M less in annual costs.
5. AI, showing up at the right time, letting competent and driven developers become 10 times more productive.

So, it’s true, there are less jobs.

But what kind of jobs are we talking about?

What jobs were available 3-4 years ago that now you don’t see any more?

I don’t see talented people out there looking for jobs.

Generally speaking, there are exceptions, the jobs that are vanishing are the jobs that are easy. What are the easy jobs? I think that’s the junior-level jobs.

Graduating from a bootcamp and getting a well paid job at a company? Probably a thing from the past. Especially if you don’t have an inch of passion for the field.

Yes I know people say “you don’t need passion to become a programmer” but trust me, it shows when there’s no passion.

But does this mean you should stop trying?

Are the doors closed now for newcomers?

Junior-level jobs get hundreds or thousands of candidates, especially the remote jobs.

It’s easy to enter doomerism thinking. Way too easy. To the point people use that as an excuse to just give up without even trying.

If you see doomerism from an “influencer” or someone trying to get likes, block the person because they’re just farming engagement by exploiting your fear.

Then, think about how you can stand out.

The fundamentals of how to land a job have not changed.

I’m talking about ancient times (I’ve been in the field since 2008), but I’ve never landed a job by sending a curriculum for a remote job, even when the job market was good. I got some rounds of interviews, yes, but there’s always someone better than you.

All of the times I got a job, it was because of one of those 2 reasons:

• people found my work online, and contacted me
• I contacted people I already knew from real-life interactions

This is super common and has been going on forever. If you need to hire someone, first you reach to your close network. Some time ago I listened to this podcast episode where Adam Wathan talks about hiring 2 people, they got a ton of applications, but ended up hiring 2 people they did not even apply. They knew them in the real world from past encounters.

I’d not be surprised if this happened way more than one thinks.

Even at big companies like Google, you have much better chances if someone already working at Google sponsors your application. Referrals often help your application stand out, as they suggest that someone within the company believes in your potential. They add credibility. You still have to be good at what you do, but you get so far ahead of the mass when you have friends inside.

If you’re looking for a job, get the word out there. You have to have a network. How? Easiest thing is going to local meetups, and local conferences. Even with 10 or 20 people in those gatherings, it’s even better than large conferences where everyone is busy talking to other people.

Contact local companies, ask if they have internships.

Or go to conferences in the field you want to work in. Into PHP? Go to Laracon. Invest the money, go a few days before, comment in the online community who wants to hang out before the conference, or after it. Go to the after parties. That’s where you actually meet and get to know people.

I think this is the shortest path.

You have to have something to show for your work. Publish your work, curate your online presence. Be likable (which could just mean being a good listener).

This post is taking a different turn on “how to find a job”. On AI doomerism, let me tell you something.

No one knows what will happen, as always, but I have my idea.

I think way too many people are influenced by this thinking, and one thing I think about this is that in just a couple years we’ll see a hiring frenzy for competent developers.

There will be millions of vacant jobs because people just stopped trying.

The AI “hype” will be replaced by tools that let competent developers be much more productive. This will make it possible to build products way faster, add features faster, fail faster, find success faster.

People “in trouble” are people that need to be guided all the time, or people that dismiss AI as a fad.

Be in the middle ground.

It’s entirely possible AI will be able to build products on its own, but do you think management will be there looking at what the AI is doing? Reviewing commits on GitHub?

TLDR: if you’re a passion-driven competent developer, or you aspire to become one, you’ll never be out of highly paid software engineering jobs.