Software Developer Jobs Are Down 70%
People are blaming AI, but there is another obvious culprit.
Computer guys are getting schlonged?
This chart is going viral rn on twitter. It shows job listings for software developers are down 70% from their peak in 2022.
Data is from Indeed, compiled by the FRED, and only goes back to 2020.
Greg Isenberg had me freaked out for a minute:
piled on:People will blame the end of free money. But something way more interesting is happening. The middle class engineer is dying. And it's dying because they're not needed anymore.
One good dev with Github Copilot ships what entire teams did five years ago. Microsoft just reported the highest revenue per employee in history. The "entry-level engineer" doesn't exist anymore. Instead, we have product builders who happen to code. Armed with AI, they ship entire products in days. Meanwhile, the truly elite engineers are making more money than ever. And they've shifted to working mostly on frontier tech. I mean the stuff that's really hard. AGI at OpenAI. Designing rockets at SpaceX. Self-driving car tech at Tesla. Product builders are becoming solopreneurs and creators. Frontier engineers are making hedge fund money.
In 2025, "software engineer" doesn't mean what it meant in 2020. And that's what this chart really shows. The middle is gone. The top is elite status. And everyone else is becoming a builder.
Seems like it’s not a great time to be a software developer.
Finance guys are getting schlonged too?
Banking and Finance Jobs are down too. Big time. They peaked in 2022 (exact same time) and they’re down 52% since.
Everyone is getting schlonged
Job postings on Indeed are down ACROSS THE BOARD.
Is Indeed’s traffic down? Are we just tracking the downfall of Indeed?
What do the numbers look like on LinkedIn?
Global Venture Capital Funding (2018-2024)
It’s hard to ignore the correlation here with job listing and VC funding.
Surely AI is having a big impact, but if you aren’t also looking at this VC funding chart.. I mean, come on.