←back to thread

Entry-level jobs down by a third since launch of ChatGPT

(www.personneltoday.com)
119 points lsharkey602 | 3 comments | 30 Jun 25 11:38 UTC | HN request time: 0.586s | source
Show context
ttul ◴[30 Jun 25 14:09 UTC] No.44423514[source]▶
I run a mature software company that is being driven for profit (we are out of the fantastic future phase and solidly in the “make money” phase). Even with all the pressure to cut costs and increase automation, the most valuable use of LLMs is to make the software developers work more effectively, producing the feature improvements that customers want so that we can ensure customers will renew and upgrade. And to the extent that we are cutting costs, we are using AI to help us write code that lets us use infrastructure more efficiently (because infrastructure is the bulk of our costs).

But this is a software company. I think out in the “real world,” there are some low hanging fruit wins where AI replaces extremely routine boilerplate jobs that never required a lot of human intelligence in the first place. But even then, I’d say that the general drift is that the humans who were doing those low-level jobs have a chance to step up into jobs requiring higher-level intelligence where humans have a chance to really shine. And companies are competing not by just getting rid of salaries, but by providing much better service by being able to afford to have more higher-tier people on the payroll. And by higher-tier, I don’t necessarily mean more expensive. It can be the same people that were doing the low-level jobs; they just now can spend their human-level intelligence doing more interesting and challenging work.

replies(4): >>44423568 #>>44423776 #>>44423805 #>>44424131 #
1. throwawaysleep ◴[30 Jun 25 14:30 UTC] No.44423805[source]▶
> the most valuable use of LLMs is to make the software developers work more effectively

Which means you should need fewer of them, no?

> It can be the same people that were doing the low-level jobs; they just now can spend their human-level intelligence doing more interesting and challenging work.

Why were you using capable humans on lower level work in the first place? Wouldn't you use cheaper and less skilled workers (entry level) for that work?

replies(2): >>44423870 #>>44424460 #
2. brigandish ◴[30 Jun 25 14:35 UTC] No.44423870[source]▶
Has the improved effectiveness of computers or software led you to need fewer of them?
3. ativzzz ◴[30 Jun 25 15:25 UTC] No.44424460[source]▶
> Which means you should need fewer of them, no?

I've never worked at a company that didn't have an endless backlog of work that needs to be done. In theory, AI should enable devs to churn through that work slightly faster, but at the same time, AI will also allow PMs/work creators to create even more work to do.

I don't think AI fundamentally changes companies hiring strategies for knowledge workers. If a company wants to cheap out and do the same amount of work with less workers, then they're leaving space for their competitors to come and edge them out