SuperStar Coders jerked it in. Other, not as much

Copyright © HT Digital Streams Limit all rights reserved. Economist, The Economist 4 Min Read 16 Sept 2025, 03:24 PM IST AS CHATGPT-like generative AI changes how code is written, businesses reconsider how many programmers they need (HT_PRINT) SUMMARY for some AI whistles, pay ballistic Lucas Beyer is not a celebration. But in Silicon Valley’s rare world of machine learning talent, he is seen as one. Mr. Beyer, a former researcher at Openai, announced last month that he is leaving the Laboratory for Artificial Intelligence (AI) behind Chatgpt to join Meta, a social media giant with major AI ambitions. With the rumors offered by Mark Zuckerberg, the boss of Meta, packages worth $ 100 million to Poach Ai Whizzes, Mr. Beyer made clear that he did not obtain a nine-digit agreement. That he had to say it at all reflects the extent of the madness. Still, the race for a handful of superstar software engineers is a slump for everyone. Since chatgpt-like generative AI changes how code is written, companies think reconsider how many programmers they need. In America, posts for software developers have fallen by more than two-thirds since the beginning of 2022, according to data from indeed a recruitment website. In January, Salesforce’s boss Marc Benioff said a business manufacturer of businessware said his firm would not add any more software engineers this year due to productivity profits of AI instruments. On July 2, Microsoft, a technical giant, said it would cut about 9,000 jobs, above -the -6,000 announced in May. Many will be codes. The stir was a deviation in the payment. Glyy Orosz of the Pragmatic Engineer, a newsletter and levels.FYI, a website that employees pay, Analyzes compensation for software developers in America with at least five years of experience that started their roles between the beginning of 2022 and the beginning of 2025. Heavy street. In this level, the median payment exceeded $ 400,000 per year. Below were technical giants, including Alphabet, Microsoft and until recently, Meta, where the median payment was closer to $ 300,000. Experienced developers at most other businesses earn much less, with a median of about $ 180,000 (see Chart 2). The upper level of coders is small. One recruiter estimates that only a few hundred people worldwide have the right mix of mathematical fluency, research chips and engineering experience to develop leading AI models. They tend to cut their teeth on the same handful of AI outfits, including Openai, Anthropic and Alphabet’s Deepmind Lab. Some, like Mr. Beyer, worked at more than one of them. Most live in some technical hubs, especially San Francisco and London. Rent is Clubby. Mr. Orosz says that the top firms mostly recruit and rarely consider outsiders. Top AI engineers also do more than code. They need to be able to explain their work to product teams and help to form business strategy. Life is very different for the mere mortals. During the pandemic, technical companies swelled their engineering to meet the supplementary demand for digital services. When interest rates rose, they dropped off just as quickly. Lay-offs reached a peak in early 2023, and the rent still has to recover. Partly this reflects carefully. But the change is also structural. Generative AI automate the drug of programming. Microsoft claims that Copilot, his AI assistant, increases the productivity of developers by 10-30%, especially on recurring tasks. Many developers are now using AI instruments to make features for autoc compleets or suggest error solutions. Others let AI agents write the entire pieces of code and then polish the output. As a result, businesses may need less software engineers to build and maintain products. Many firms are completely employed while tackling. “Most companies want to see what they can do with their current workforce,” explains Zuhayeer Musa, co-founder of levels.fyi. For firms at the AI ​​border, he adds, engineers are considered to be an investment, worth ten millions of dollars if they can help use the computer infrastructure that costs billions more efficiently. For other businesses, programmers are often seen as another cost to cut. Anthropic boss Dario Amodei predicted that AI could write all code soon. This is probably optimistic. But the direction of travel is clear: The future of programming will belong less to those who write it, and more to those who build the systems. To keep up to date with the biggest stories in business and technology, you report to the bottom line, our weekly newsletter that is only subscriber. Catch all the business news, market news, news reports and latest news updates on Live Mint. Download the Mint News app to get daily market updates. More Topics #AI #Openai Read Next Story