from Hacker News

AI Is Robbing Jr. Devs

by makerdiety on 2/3/25, 4:39 AM with 15 comments

• by topkai22 on 2/3/25, 5:43 AM

  I don’t really get this attitude either way. I expect my junior devs to use all the tools at their disposal, including LLMs, to solve the problems I give them. These problems are rarely so rote that an LLM can just do them- there tends to be a great deal of context building and understating what the customer wants beyond the actual coding. That is a huge part of what I’m really offloading to the junior developer, not just writing the code.

  We still discuss the code when delivered and iterate. Devs still receive feed back on their solutions and are held to account if the solutions aren’t of sufficient quality. The social element is still there, we are now just also co learning how to use this new tool.

• by jppope on 2/3/25, 5:18 AM

  I see where the author is going, but I think we need to be realistic that LLMs are taking a cut of where we would normally use a junior dev. the value prop is fairly poor if we expect a junior to leave after 18-24 months and they aren't able to learn enough in a short enough period to get some of the investment back. I'm still all for having junior devs around- I think they provide a LOT of intangible value, but we probably should be realistic about the new world we're heading into.

• by Mossy9 on 2/3/25, 5:37 AM

  Are there any examples of other industries where the entry level was disrupted, so that there was reduced demand for workers below senior level? If that's what happening to software development, could some parallels be drawn?

  Apprenticeship has pretty much disappeared, even from trades, but as far as I know, "juniors" have always been in demand, if for nothing else but the lower salaries.

• by drewcoo on 2/3/25, 5:57 AM

  The present is robbing the future. Old story.

• by poisonborz on 2/3/25, 7:18 AM

  Junior devs can also use LLMs thereby making them better than LLMs.