A computer science degree in most US colleges takes about 4 years of work. Boot camps try to cram that into 6 months. All the while many students have other full-time jobs. This is simply not enough training for the students to start solving complex real world problem. Even 4 years is not enough.
Many companies were willing to hire fresh college grads in the hopes that they could solve relatively easy problems for a few years, gain experience and become successful senior devs at some point.
However, with the advent of AI dev tools, we are seeing very clear signs that junior dev hiring rates have fallen off a cliff. Our project manager, who has no dev experience, frequently assigns easy tasks/github issues to Github Copilot. Copilot generates a PR in a few minutes that other devs can review before merging. These PRs are far superior to what an average graduate of a code boot camp could ever create. Any need we had for a junior dev has completely disappeared.
That's the question that has been stuck in my head as I read all these stories about junior dev jobs disappearing. I'm firmly mid-level, having started my career just before LLM coding took off. Sometimes it feels like I got on the last chopper out of Saigon.
Many companies were willing to hire fresh college grads in the hopes that they could solve relatively easy problems for a few years, gain experience and become successful senior devs at some point.
However, with the advent of AI dev tools, we are seeing very clear signs that junior dev hiring rates have fallen off a cliff. Our project manager, who has no dev experience, frequently assigns easy tasks/github issues to Github Copilot. Copilot generates a PR in a few minutes that other devs can review before merging. These PRs are far superior to what an average graduate of a code boot camp could ever create. Any need we had for a junior dev has completely disappeared.