[bdangubic]

> Especially for software developers it looks increasingly that after huge turmoil it's likely we will need +/- the same number of developers in the world.

what exactly are you basing this opinion on? All I am seeing personally across multiple projects I am working on and other friends at other places is that downsizing is either begun or is planned (to exclude from here all the “public” layoffs we see on the news). Given how most business operate in the USA I think most of “AI strategies” are “we can do same with -40% staff” vs. “we can do XX% more work with same staff.”

[jrumbut]

The past couple of years have been chaotic and fearful. Hopefully that won't last forever.

If we can get a little stability, people will begin thinking less in terms of "how do we do the same thing cheaper" and more in terms of "how do we do new things."

[bdangubic]

I love this optimism but I after a (too) long career I think that 3rd thing will win out - "how we do new things - but cheaper (or as cheap as possible)" there are sooooo many different articles that have been discussed here on HN that basically argue "coding has never been the bottleneck" which to me is the biggest lie SWEs are currently trying to tell themselves, I have been coding 30+ years now and coding has always been the bottleneck. hiring new developers has always been justified with "we have all this work that needs to be done and not enough people to get the work done." with llms in the fold, I am questioning how will these decisions be made in the future? perhaps in the most simplistic view:

1. run a bigger "agent army"

2. hire more people to control and guide the existing "agent army"

I think it'll be #1 and SWEs will be expected to do more work and work longer hours in the future (those that are able to keep their jobs). this is more pessimistic outlook than yours so I hope you are right more than I am :)

edit: just now on the HN front page: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/05/08/technology/meta-ai-employ...

[fc417fc802]

> that basically argue "coding has never been the bottleneck"

> we have all this work that needs to be done and not enough people to get the work done

I believe the reasoning is roughly to ask, what was occupying the developer hours? Was the majority of it typing out lines of code or was it reasoning about higher level concerns?

It usually comes up in response to predictions that the role of developer will be completely replaced in the near future. It's possible to observe significant efficiency gains without obviating the need for everything the role was doing.

Of course such reasoning has little to do with projections of future developer employment numbers. Will the switch from push mowers to gas mowers reduce the demand for people who get paid to mow lawns by increasing their efficiency? Will it increase the total lawn acreage across the market? It could well do both. However, if it makes having a lawn affordable for the average joe it could counterintuitively increase demand for the job.

Of course the stated goal of the AI companies is to develop the analog of fully robotic lawnmowers. But despite how impressive recent advancements have been we still have yet to see any evidence of novel abstract reasoning or a theory that would be expected to lead to it.

In other words, people have been speculating about the development of fully autonomous lawnmowers and the risk that they unilaterally decide to cut us all down for the past 50 years. "I, lawnmower" was a smash hit a few years ago. Now gas ones have appeared and continue to make rapid advancements but still no convincing signs of autonomy.

[oblio]

> I believe the reasoning is roughly to ask, what was occupying the developer hours? Was the majority of it typing out lines of code or was it reasoning about higher level concerns?

You're obviously right and the people who think that are the managerial types that think software developers were glorified secretaries writing after dictation.

LLM is great at generating stuff, but it's basically 3D printing. Amazing, but most of the high quality stuff in the world needs to be built at large scale out of aluminum, steel, wood, etc. Yes, I know there are large advances in 3D printing, but maybe 0.000000001% of all manufacturing in the world are done using 3D printing. A lot of stuff will probably never be possible using 3D printing.