> I'm confident the LLMs that exist today can't replace developers, and I wouldn't be surprised if they don't "augment" developers so fewer developers + LLMs do

> I'm confident the LLMs that exist today can't replace developers, and I wouldn't be surprised if they don't "augment" developers so fewer developers + LLMs don't maintain the same productivity. But perhaps many programmers are being fired because many programmers just aren't necessary, and AI is just a placebo. The last part is the important part. There's loads of jobs that don't "need" to exist in software gigs at many companies generally, ranging from lowly maintenance type CRUD jobs to highly complex work that has no path to profitability, but was financially justifiable a few years prior in a different financial environment. Examples: IIRC, Amazon had some game engine thing that had employed a bunch of graphics programmers (Lumberyard maybe?) that they scrapped (probably for cost reasons), Alexa has been a public loss leader and has had loads of layoffs. Google had their game streaming service that got shelved and other stuff I can't recall that they've surely abandoned in recent years, etc. Those roles were certainly highly skilled, but mgmt saw no path to profit or whatever, so they're gone. There's also the opposite in some cases. Many f500s are pissing away money to get some "AI" "Enabled" thing for their whatever and throwing money at companies like Accenture et al to get them some RAG chatbot thing. There's certainly a brief period where those opportunities will increase as every CTO wants to "modernize" and "leverage AI", although I can't imagine it lasting.