Graduate Job Postings Plummet, But AI May Not Be the Primary Culprit (ft.com) 41
Job postings for entry-level roles requiring degrees have dropped nearly two-thirds in the UK and 43% in the US since ChatGPT launched in 2022, according to Financial Times analysis of Adzuna data. The decline spans sectors with varying AI exposure -- UK graduate openings fell 75% in banking, 65% in software development, but also 77% in human resources and 55% in civil engineering.
Indeed research found only weak correlation between occupations mentioning AI most frequently and those with the steepest job posting declines. US Bureau of Labor Statistics data showed no clear relationship between an occupation's AI exposure and young worker losses between 2022-2024. Economists say economic uncertainty, post-COVID workforce corrections, increased offshoring, and reduced venture capital funding are likely primary drivers of the graduate hiring slowdown.
Indeed research found only weak correlation between occupations mentioning AI most frequently and those with the steepest job posting declines. US Bureau of Labor Statistics data showed no clear relationship between an occupation's AI exposure and young worker losses between 2022-2024. Economists say economic uncertainty, post-COVID workforce corrections, increased offshoring, and reduced venture capital funding are likely primary drivers of the graduate hiring slowdown.
Same old story ... (Score:5, Insightful)
Graduate Job Postings Plummet, But AI May Not Be the Primary Culprit
This is an old story and some of us are old enough to have seen it before:
1) Corporations scream for experienced people.
2) Corporations lament how they cannot justify the expense of providing new graduates with experience.
3) Corporations bribe politicians into allowing the import large numbers of experienced foreign labor.
4) There is a popular backlash against immigrant labor.
5) We have arrived at the exact point in time where we are now.
Lather, rinse, repeat the same stupid cycle ad nauseam except at each iteration the anti-immigrant sentiment grows, the corpocrats and the politicians get richer and everybody else gets poorer.
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> 5) We have arrived at the exact point in time where we are now.
Can't disagree with that one lol
WHEN WILL THEN BE NOW? SOON!
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> 5) We have arrived at the exact point in time where we are now.
Can't disagree with that one lol
WHEN WILL THEN BE NOW? SOON!
Well, It feels a bit like that Movie 'Groundhog Day' except each time I get back to (1) I don't revert to my former youthful self and get a do-over.
Question for the UK (Score:2)
Question for the UK:
What is left of GDP when you remove:
- Producing, transporting, selling fluor, bread, milk, eggs, butter and other basic foods
- Shuffling financial paper around in the stock and bond markets
- GDP related to heating, lighting, and providing water to government funded housing
- GDP related to operating, maintaining, and administering government funded housing
- GDP related to operating prisons and jails
- GDP related to operating, maintaining and staffing historic government buildings
What is t
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> 5) We have arrived at the exact point in time where we are now.
Can't disagree with that one lol
WHEN WILL THEN BE NOW? SOON!
TIFO that wherever you go, that's where you are at!
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Add to that, outsource all manufacturing to cheap labor countries that can pollute without repercussions.
Later, outsource design of the same products.
Net result is "selling the farm" for short term profits. CEOs and their underlings get their bonuses for "doing such a good job". They leave the company and declare their accomplishments as something great, leaving a carcass of what was once a productive company.
Rinse and repeat.
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There's also a growing realization among hiring managers that they don't need a college grad for an entry level office admin or a barista, and that people without one will work for less money.
greedy capitalist corporations gone uncontrollabl (Score:1)
I am a proud American Citizen of Indian origin going thru my 25th year in the US (ex Georgia Tech + MIT startups).
And I have witnessed greedy capitalist American industries selling their soul, laying of locals, outsourcing everything abroad, with no remorse.
WTF
I also blame my divorce on greedy American capitalism gone woke+broke (ex-Akamai, etc).
Insightful comment about the layoff machine from https://m.slashdot.org/story/4... [slashdot.org] : "The social costs with these mass job losses are paid in divorces, broken homes
Social costs (Score:2)
The social costs happen during times when both political parities have held office in the US.
It's not just one party, the out of power political wants an angry disaffected group to appeal to and get votes from.
The long tail voting demographic is that people who do not work for wages, work part time, or have their living expenses paid for by a working spouse/partner are much more likely to vote for feel-good programs, government social handouts, and more accommodation of whatever social behavior people want
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Tech / IT really needs an trades system (Score:3)
Tech / IT really needs an trades system not degrees
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That really doesn't sound like an IT job to me. More neuroscience, really.
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So honest question.. if you have just been interested in computers all your life and have self learned and shown proficiency with basically every language while also learning every application server and how to make clients for them, what trade is that exactly?
Sounds exactly like a trade to me. In today's world, people with trades are looked at as mentally deficient. When in fact, many of us have great respect for tradespeople, who despite the narrative, are not subnormals. But the strange thing about your statement - your hypothetical person who self trained and exhibits proficiency might never have stepped on a campus, nor earned that degree that signifies they are an Übermenchen.
So they have a trade, not a college degree. And your hypothetical is almo
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The whole argument being presented is that currently it's not being treated as a trade, but it should be. Then you ask what existing trade it is. It isn't an existing trade; if it was, the argument to create a new trade wouldn't need to be made.
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But if it is a trade, then you must name the trade that it is. My point is that a lot of. People don't fit into a template like that.
Quick question before I reply to the topic here. I noticed that you had a period placed where it shouldn't be. I have been having the same issue, and my autocomplete is turning into a real pain in the ass, even completing my sentences on occasion. And often deciding to put periods where they don't belong. Are you having the same problem?
Anyhow, the matter of what a trade is or isn't is kind of fluid. If you look at Wikipedia, they have a good definition, which is:
"A tradesperson or tradesman/tradeswom
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"A tradesperson or tradesman/tradeswoman is a skilled worker that specialises in a particular trade"... so let me rephrase the question.... How does a person that knows every language differentiate themselves from someone who only knows web development? Clearly the web developer would be in the "web dev
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Tech / IT really needs an trades system not degrees
The 30-year old IT Certification Universe would like to have a word with you.
Out behind the old Citrix building. After Network+ class.
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It needs both: An engineering track that is proper engineering, and teaches all the advanced and hard to do stuff. Say 10% of the graduates. And a "technician" track that is more like a trade-school and teaches how to do all the well understood standard stuff right, like system administration, business coding, network administration, etc. Say 90% of the graduates.
Incidentally, for all engineering except IT, Europe has that. And ways to go from "technician" to "engineer" if you find you want that and have th
Tell me this is irrelevant without telling me... (Score:2)
Tech layoffs are up sharply starting in 2022 specifically, so it follows that job postings would also be down in the same period.
Not sure what the point of this article is when the author wants to call out AI specifically and then claim AI might not be the cause.
Re:Tell me this is irrelevant without telling me.. (Score:5, Funny)
I think that the dirty secret is that when big tech companies are laying off their employees and replacing them with AI, the "AI" actually stands for "Actually Indians".
COVID taught the tech execs that most IT work can be done almost fully remotely. In their minds, they're probably thinking that if Joe Developer or Johnny DevOps Guy can work 100% remote from Ohio or Montana, they can probably get Samir or Gupta to do it from Bangalore or Delhi for 1/3rd the price.
It also doesn't help that the tech execs that tried this back in the 2001-2009 are mostly retired now, so there aren't senior managers reminding them why this didn't work the first time they tried it.
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I think that the dirty secret is that when big tech companies are laying off their employees and replacing them with AI, the "AI" actually stands for "Actually Indians".
Do you have the numbers to assert your assertion? Citations please.
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It also doesn't help that the tech execs that tried this back in the 2001-2009 are mostly retired now, so there aren't senior managers reminding them why this didn't work the first time they tried it.
Yep, stupid people will make the same dumb mistakes again and again once an opportunity presents itself.
Counciling a young potential CS major (Score:1, Interesting)
Why should they work harder for less reward than someone who just parties and drinks their
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It depends. When you take it seriously, enjoy it and have talent, an applied CS or IT degree makes you an expert of which there never will be enough. If you "just want a job", CS/IT is a really bad choice though.
Management is still fighting the idea that engineering works needs qualified engineers (and a good applied CS degree is effectively an engineering degree even if typically not called that), but my take is that when the current AI insanity collapses, it will be another step to the general recognition
Maybe (Score:2)
Maybe they are seeing less value in Indians with Masters degrees in whatever. I've long felt that these masters degrees were being bought on a street corner. The holders don't really seem to have a grasp on the subject matter that they have supposedly mastered.
High interest rates are designed for recession (Score:1)
The way it works is pretty simple.
So most companies do not keep much cash around. Besides the ones that are making so much money they literally can't spend it fast enough like Apple computer or Nvidia most companies are a few bad weeks maybe a few bad months away from disaster.
This is because any cash in the company is immediately extracted for the s
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not to mention... (Score:2)
"economic uncertainty, post-COVID workforce corrections, increased offshoring, and reduced venture capital funding are likely primary drivers of the graduate hiring slowdown"
Not to mention stock buybacks making investors rich while reducing the size of the employment funds available.
Work from Home Making Outsourcing Easier (Score:2)