There’s no AI or offshoring death spiral. Companies overhired for years when they had access to cheap money (low interest rates). Now we see the correction in t

There’s no AI or offshoring death spiral. Companies overhired for years when they had access to cheap money (low interest rates). Now we see the correction in the form of layoffs and hiring freezes. Look outside of tech companies and you will see plenty of jobs in other industries. Those companies will prefer business domain experience. A lot of developers with little experience will now discover that most employers don’t really care about stacks or leetcode, React or Node, Rust or C++. In the world of FAANG and startups imitating the tech giants, maybe, because other developers run the interview process. In the rest of world employers want to hire people who can add business value and solve actual problems. The most durable and lucrative skills I have all date from decades ago: Unix system admin, C and C++, and relational databases with SQL. If I had to pick one today I would choose SQL. In five years no one will remember React/Redux, but Oracle experts will do fine. People calling themselves “full stack” when they can’t write an aggregate query in SQL or change permissions on a directory in Linux make me laugh. The software business suffers way too much from fads and fashion to invest your career in one or two things that seem hot right now. Better to master the core technologies and work on foundational knowledge. I got lucky — a mentor told me that early in my career, almost 40 years ago. Still good advice.