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bwestergardyesterday at 6:55 PM2 repliesview on HN

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 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 senior engineers can now write 3x as much code, etc."

If you want an anecdote: the media company I work for just started hiring interns and juniors in software career tracks again after a lengthy hiatus.


Replies

txruyesterday at 8:16 PM

I have a suspicion that Twitter laying off so much of the software staff was very influential for people with hiring abilities. The company didn't crash, and they (relatively slowly) began shipping new features again. I think that coincided with the pandemic-era overhiring, and we've been working against that combo ever since.

Every now and then, I actively try to make an LLM replace my tasks, and fully do greenfield projects I would accept- I don't see it. It's very good, no doubt. But I have or have been given the project parameters, and just like with a junior, failures in communication inevitably lead to breakdowns in execution.

show 2 replies
red75primeyesterday at 9:00 PM

> https://www.employamerica.org/labor-market-analysis/dont-bla...

I would have preferred someone who uses a null hypothesis and statistical tests.