2025-10-24
Goodbye, IT army?
Or how programmers became the new lawyers.
Or how programmers became the new lawyers.
Remember 10–15 years ago when the whole world was shouting:
“We’re desperately short of developers!”
It felt like if you weren’t coding, you were basically wasting oxygen. Bootcamps, online courses, “IT for moms,” “IT for pets,” “how to learn Python in 2 hours.” And now here’s the 2025 headline: Over 40,000 tech workers laid off — just in February and April — from Microsoft, Meta, Google, Amazon, and others. This isn’t just trimming the fat — this is “Armageddon-as-a-Service.”
“We’re desperately short of developers!”
It felt like if you weren’t coding, you were basically wasting oxygen. Bootcamps, online courses, “IT for moms,” “IT for pets,” “how to learn Python in 2 hours.” And now here’s the 2025 headline: Over 40,000 tech workers laid off — just in February and April — from Microsoft, Meta, Google, Amazon, and others. This isn’t just trimming the fat — this is “Armageddon-as-a-Service.”
Why?
- Automation. If you wrote a script to automate your job, congratulations — you automated yourself out of it.
- AI. ChatGPT can write code now… and also explain how it wrote the code.
- Market saturation. If being a developer used to be like being a pilot in the 60s, now it’s more like a lawyer in the 2000s. Too many resumes, not enough runway.
So what jobs can’t really be replaced by AI?
Physicists, chemists, biologists.
AI can simulate a reaction, but it can’t discover a new molecule in a lab. Someone still has to invent the cure for AI addiction.
Historians and cultural researchers.
AI remembers everything, but understands nothing. It’ll confuse Peter the Great with Peter the Not-So-Great in a heartbeat.
Engineers — especially the industrial kind.
A robot won’t fix itself. When the machine breaks, you need Alexei with a wrench, not GPT with a paragraph.
Scientists in fundamental research.
AI can spit out hypotheses, but it doesn’t have gut instinct. You can’t replace that flash of insight with a transformer model. Yet.
Trades: electricians, plumbers, builders.
Try asking ChatGPT to fix your leaking toilet. Let me know how that goes.
Psychologists, teachers, doctors — the kind that look you in the eye, not at a data chart.
AI can diagnose. It can’t reassure.
Prostitution.
You know the deal. Although, even that’s getting weird in the metaverse.
Just so you know:
🔮 So what should a high school student do when picking a major?
(And what should their parents stop pushing?)
Pick depth, not hype. Here are fields that won’t go out of fashion anytime soon:
Or, for the brave ones:
Build your own thing.
Entrepreneurship is still one of the few jobs where you can’t get fired.
Unless it’s by your co-founder. Or investors. Or the economy. But hey — at least it’s exciting.
Final note:
AI isn’t the enemy. It’s a tool. But if you become a tool — one that AI can replace — then eventually… it will.
So don’t chase what’s trendy. Chase what’s timeless. And leave the jokes to AI. We’re still funnier 😎
AI can simulate a reaction, but it can’t discover a new molecule in a lab. Someone still has to invent the cure for AI addiction.
Historians and cultural researchers.
AI remembers everything, but understands nothing. It’ll confuse Peter the Great with Peter the Not-So-Great in a heartbeat.
Engineers — especially the industrial kind.
A robot won’t fix itself. When the machine breaks, you need Alexei with a wrench, not GPT with a paragraph.
Scientists in fundamental research.
AI can spit out hypotheses, but it doesn’t have gut instinct. You can’t replace that flash of insight with a transformer model. Yet.
Trades: electricians, plumbers, builders.
Try asking ChatGPT to fix your leaking toilet. Let me know how that goes.
Psychologists, teachers, doctors — the kind that look you in the eye, not at a data chart.
AI can diagnose. It can’t reassure.
Prostitution.
You know the deal. Although, even that’s getting weird in the metaverse.
Just so you know:
- According to the World Economic Forum, by 2030, 97 million new jobs will be created, but 85 million will be eliminated.
- The shortfall? Expected in areas that rely on human touch, science, and engineering — not in endless lines of code.
🔮 So what should a high school student do when picking a major?
(And what should their parents stop pushing?)
Pick depth, not hype. Here are fields that won’t go out of fashion anytime soon:
- Fundamental sciences (physics, chemistry, biology) — especially when paired with engineering.
- Applied medicine and biotech.
- Cybersecurity and AI ethics (yep, someone needs to protect us from the AI).
- Research & analytics in renewable energy, advanced materials, neuroscience.
- Engineers with actual hands. The kind that use screwdrivers and common sense.
Or, for the brave ones:
Build your own thing.
Entrepreneurship is still one of the few jobs where you can’t get fired.
Unless it’s by your co-founder. Or investors. Or the economy. But hey — at least it’s exciting.
Final note:
AI isn’t the enemy. It’s a tool. But if you become a tool — one that AI can replace — then eventually… it will.
So don’t chase what’s trendy. Chase what’s timeless. And leave the jokes to AI. We’re still funnier 😎
To keeping the pulse of the innovation going
Tom
Venture Capitalist