This article glances but neglects two things:<p>1. ctrl-f "covid": 0<p>It's irresponsible to talk about the boom and bust cycles in hiring over the past ~4 years without mentioning covid and WFH [0]. Companies over-hired and over-retained for reasons like cheaper remote labor, prematurely extrapolating trends from large and sudden shifts in ecommerce/streaming/etc revenues, and ol-fashioned camaraderie (really). This positioned the industry to get doubly rekt, because even in good times, that retention debt would need to be paid down, and in bad times, it's even bloodier. There's some bullwhip effect[1] to this, where hiring too many people leads to needing to cut spend in a hurry, which invites more overcorrection, leads to needing to hire all the sudden, etc etc. It's my impression that these swings in developer hiring are continuing to go back and forth, with slightly lessening intensity each cycle, consistent with this effect. I think the pain will continue, but will also continue to lessen, over the next few years.<p>2. "has turned into a stock market driven movement..."<p>It's correct to tie a lot of this to market health and general macroeconomic environment. But what drives those things? The larger geopolitical landscape has a big influence here, albeit one that's hard to predict. For example the usa's post-war boom years happened when europe was in shambles and rebuilding, and the usa was mostly intact and well positioned for a manufacturing boom that serviced the rest of the west. there's some cause for optimism here, since again the US is recovering better that most other nations economically. Friends in JP and AUS are lamenting the weakness of their currency lately (or rejoicing, when they earn in USD and spend in local dollars). The next 10-20 yrs will see large, consequential geopolitical movement, particularly w/r/t china. Does the US successfully onshore/reshore semiconductor manufacturing? If so, does it exist alongside Taiwan, or do they weaken or face attack? What becomes of china and russia's demographic crises and budding codependency? Is the US drawn into a large conflict for those or other reasons? Does that cause the US to trend towards unity, or further politically atomize?<p>To me, these questions matter as much as, if not more than, AI advances. If the macro environment is strong, higher paying jobs will be more available, even if they're not needed as badly. If the macro environment is weak, AI successes will be a rocketship trapped under a low market ceiling. And if AI advancements are so staggeringly powerful that they mostly nullify the effects of macroeconomics and geopolitics.... this whole article goes out the window because the world it was written for has ceased to exist.<p>[0] Article mentions RTO, but only as a means of shadow layoff<p>[1] <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullwhip_effect" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullwhip_effect</a>