Pro tip: I used to write all my own code for a simple data sorting job... now I just ask an AI to do it in seconds.

For about 2 years, I manually built scripts to clean up client survey data. Then 6 months ago, I tried an AI coding tool on a whim. It wrote a better script in under a minute. I saved 15 hours of work that week, but now I'm wondering what happens when this scales up and whole teams of junior devs aren't needed to learn those basics. Has anyone else had a moment where the efficiency gain felt a little too real?

4 comments

4 Comments

ivan7743mo ago

Remember how we used to say robots would take the boring jobs so we could do creative work? What happens when the "boring job" was the only way into the field? If AI writes all the basic scripts, how does a new person ever learn what good code looks like? You can't fix a broken AI script if you've never built one yourself. We might end up with a bunch of people who can only talk to the machine but have no idea how it actually works.

aaron_perry3mo ago

Watch the middle rungs of every ladder disappear.

emeryc213mo ago

That's a scary idea, but it's not quite how it works. The middle jobs are still there, they just pay less now. Like a manager at a fast food place makes way less than they used to, adjusted for inflation. The rung exists, it's just become a lot thinner and more slippery for anyone trying to climb up.

elliotm571mo ago

My friend's kid wanted to be a graphic designer, but all the junior assistant jobs that taught the real software are gone. Now he just prompts an AI and hopes for the best. It totally reminds me of what @ivan774 said about not knowing how things actually work. He can make something that looks okay, but has no clue how to fix it when the client asks for a real change.