AI Impact on Tech Jobs: What It Means

There has been discussion for over a year regarding whether artificial intelligence tools are resulting in fewer jobs for software engineers and coders. Some initially believed AI would increase worker efficiency, but it appears that AI is replacing workers, at least in big tech.

Salesforce is the latest company to say its internal use of AI tools has allowed it to reduce hiring, especially for engineers and customer service workers. This seems to be becoming common among large tech firms, suggesting the impact AI could have on jobs for software developers, coders, and engineers.

Chief Financial and Operations Officer Robin Washington stated in an interview that the company is hiring fewer software engineers because of AI-driven productivity gains. She said that they view AI as assistants, but they will allow the company to hire fewer people and make the existing team more productive.

Millions of students around the world, including in India, are training to be software engineers. Their chances of getting a job at the world’s biggest tech companies may be decreasing because of AI.

Initially, AI tools from companies like OpenAI, Google, and Salesforce were considered a way to improve productivity. Now, those in the tech industry may be among the most likely to be displaced by AI.

LinkedIn’s chief economic opportunity officer, Aneesh Raman, wrote that office workers are facing the same kind of technological and economic disruption. He added that the bottom rung of the career ladder is being affected first.

Hiring hasn’t stopped completely, but it is reportedly becoming more difficult to get a first job in tech, especially after graduating from college. Tech company leaders have indicated that AI is taking over jobs. Salesforce has admitted that its hiring has decreased due to AI, which makes it clear that more tech companies are starting to depend on artificial intelligence over human labor for certain tasks.

At Microsoft, engineers are using AI to write 20% to 30% of code for company projects, according to CEO Satya Nadella. Nadella said that the percentage of AI-generated code varies by programming language, noting that AI writes good Python code, but its C++ capabilities are not as good. Nadella also shared that Microsoft is using more advanced AI agents to review code.

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said the company plans to use AI for half of its software development within the next year. Zuckerberg stated that Meta is developing AI that can write code at the level of a mid-level engineer and plans to have a lot of its code built by AI engineers instead of people engineers this year.

Google CEO Sundar Pichai said the company was using AI to write over 30% of new code. He also said that employees are accepting AI-suggested code more often.

Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei acknowledged that AI is writing code and predicted that AI could be writing 90% of all new code in just three to six months.

Duolingo CEO Luis von Ahn said that the company will replace many of its human contract workers with AI.

AI chatbots like ChatGPT and GitHub Copilot were initially viewed as tools for basic tasks. Now, they are being used to write full code.

OpenAI recently released Codex, an AI coding engine within ChatGPT. Google has introduced GeminiCode Assist, a code-review agent that identifies bugs and offers suggestions within GitHub. Code Assist allows developers to interact with a Google AI model to access and edit their codebase.

The impact of AI is apparent, especially on entry-level tech jobs. SignalFire reported that major tech companies, including Meta, Microsoft, and Google, recruited fewer recent graduates in 2024 compared to previous years. New graduates accounted for just 7% of new hires in 2024, a decrease from previous years. At startups, the rate of new graduate hiring has also dropped.

While big tech companies are investing in AI infrastructure, layoffs continue. This year, over 62,114 tech workers have been laid off from both large and small tech firms, according to Layoffs.fyi.