[suraci]

> If nothing else, my workflows as a software developer have changed significantly in these past two years with just what's available today, and there is so much work going into making that workflow far more productive.

this is exactly the problem

The more productivity AI brings to workers, the fewer employees employers need to hire, the less salary employers need to pay, and the less money workers have for consumption.

capitalist mode of production

[simonw]

What's your opinion on the productivity boost open source libraries have brought to developers?

Did all of that free code reduce demand for developers? If not, why not?

[suraci]

> Did all of that free code reduce demand for developers?

the anwser is yes, while in the meantime, the expansion of the industry offset the surplus of developers.

[simonw]

I think the answer is that open source made developers more valuable because they could build you a whole lot more functionality for the same amount of effort thanks to not having to constantly reinvent every wheel that they needed.

More effective developers results in more demand for custom software, resulting in more jobs for developers.

My hope is that AI-assisted programming will have similar results.

[edanm]

How likely do you think this is Simon?

I don't really know myself, but I think there's a decent change that most developer jobs will actually disappear. Your argument isn't wrong, but when we're nearing (though still far from) the state where all productive tech work can be handled by LLMs. Once it can effectively and correctly fix bugs and add new well-defined features to a real codebase, things start to look very different for most developers.

[andsoitis]

Less productivity seems like a worse path.

[suraci]

it depends how you define good or worse

for humanity, the increase in productivity is progress

i'm not saying it's bad, i'm saying it has consequences