To a much smaller extent due to where I live, I noticed this too. From merely the fact that I had a (local economy relative) high paying software job and that I could "make stuff happen" for people with capital or people in the "boys club", I was introduced to an entirely different layer of the city I had no idea about. I noticed how effortlessly the signals transfer and how it all feels very meritocratic, you don't even notice the layer and you just see the people. Until someone who's not in that layer shows up, and suddenly the doors close, the conversation chills and the barriers to the layer become evident.

I am very curious how this changes for young technologists in an AI era, where maybe non-technical people in this layer no longer see a self made technologist as a value add to their cohort.

I purposely use technologist over software developer, since I feelnthe generalist self-made developer typically commands an intuitive breadth of skills not just programming.

I also didn't make out like Zuck, though I am happily working and making games on the side.

This is completely correct. It's the same reason why an MBA or PhD can be valuable if you want to go the management track. In Europe specifically - especially in the UK - the class based system is still alive and kicking and is based on subtle tells such as education, name, accent and more. It's less overt than in say India, but still very much present.

For those looking for one practical way to do this in the US, I can share my story.

In the US I waited until I was 24 years old to transfer to a 4 year university, because my parents were somewhat well off and utterly unwilling to help with my student loans when push came to shove - even though my financial aid was calculated based on their income and assets. At 24, I was reclassified as an "independent student", and my financial aid was now calculated solely on my (nonexistent) assets. The dynamic entirely flipped and I got to go full time, and even live in a dorm and stuff.

Between 18 and 24, then, one has roughly six years to get a 2 year community college degree out of the way for relative pennies on the dollar. That's a lot of time! Federal loans can pay for all or nearly all of this, but CCs are generally cheap enough that even on minimum wage one can generally budget the ~$100-200 per month it takes to take one or two classes per semester. (I wouldn't actually recommend paying out of pocket if you can avoid it, because your quality of life suffers far more from a $200 extra per month when you are making minimum wage vs when you are making six figures, but to each their own.)

If you fear you won't be able to transfer to a 4 year university for whatever reason, there are 2 year degrees which provide on-ramps to paid work; my original degree was going to be like that until I switched plans to the transfer approach.

The time I spent in a 4 year university weren't entirely covered by grants of course, but it was many multiples cheaper than it would have been had I insisted on going right out the gate. I don't think I would have been approved for the six figures of loans I would have needed with that plan with such unwilling parents. I walked away with low figures total in debt, which is much more manageable, and has a much higher ROI than e.g. $30,000 of a house mortgage. I actually somehow ended up holding less student debt than most college degree holders I have met here in Finland, where tuition is free and loans are intended to pay for everything else (housing, etc).

Hi, can you elaborate, I don't think I understand what you mean.

Yes 100%. I was born upper middle class. I have a BIT from a global top 50 University. I understood this after working in cryptocurrency sector in Germany.

After I left Australia and moved to Europe, I realized after some time that 'the matrix' had demoted me into a lower social class. I had to work harder for less money and had access to fewer opportunities.

Then I joined the crypto sector and the people there seemed almost mentally deranged. I didn't understand it at first. They had a way, way, way more cynical view of the world than I did. In retrospect, it feels like they had been under attack by the system, in secret... And they saw any outsider as an enemy. I felt like I was disliked for not being cynical enough. Like my subtle optimism was a signal that I didn't belong. It made me a target.

Then I came back to Australia after having a really tough time and switched back to mainstream tech sector and it was like everyone I worked with was living in some fantasy world. Like 10x more naive than I ever was, all colleagues with master degrees and PhDs... Work was a lot easier too. More forgiving. Also, I was liked. People were almost too nice to me.

The difference is privilege. I can see it very clearly now. It's absolutely not based on culture or race.

Society is highly stratified and I believe there are mechanisms built into the system to prevent people from different classes to meet.

I feel like there is some kind of operating system which manufactures cultures to create separations... Traditions and taboos separate people to prevent them from sharing their experiences and to maintain blind spots which serve to hold the system together. I think I understand why rich people don't like to hang around regular people.

Have you ever wondered why people don't talk to strangers anymore? I went to a train museum recently and noticed that the carriages on old trains had seats facing each other; I sat on one side and thought to myself that it must have been awkward for people to stare at each other in the face, sitting so close to each other, with nothing and nobody standing in between them... for such long trips. Carriages were split between 'smoking' and 'non-smoking'... Nowadays carriages are split between 'normal' and 'quiet'... And the number of quiet carriages seems to have increased over time... It's like there are forces in society which try to prevent people with different experiences from sharing their experiences. This is masked by superficial differences; superficial mental and physical differences are fine but experiential differences are not.

When I watch modern movies, they seem to show characters from an elite perspective. Even characters who are depicted as poor seem to share elite ideologies which makes the characters not believable.

Also, beyond values, there are some material distortions; I've seen too many detective series were the cop is living in a luxury penthouse.

Shouldn't a bad job market convince people to get a degree?

You only miss a bad job market entry and low salaries, you need every meagre advantage you can get.

100% agree on a degree being a strong signal, by the way.

Most of the value of a CS degree is being able to say that you have a degree truthfully. If you don't have a degree then you just lie and say that you do, which is a moral papercut. Nobody really cares about your education though, they just want their world view to be maintained.

https://www.newyorkfed.org/research/college-labor-market#--:... (note: Latest Release: February 4, 2026, based on data from 2024)

Yes, this has unemployment computer engineering at #2 with 7.8% and computer science at #5 at 7.0%.

Philosophy is at 5.1% unemployment.

The next column is also important to look at - the underemployment rate. Is the graduate in a profession that requires the degree.

    The underemployment rate is defined as the share of graduates working in jobs that typically do not require a college degree. A job is classified as a college job if 50 percent or more of the people working in that job indicate that at least a bachelor's degree is necessary; otherwise, the job is classified as a non-college job.

Underemployment for computer engineering is at 15.8% (3rd lowest) and computer science is at 19.1% (9th lowest).

If you want a unemployment rate for computer science that matches philosophy the answer is easy - hold your nose and take the front desk receptionist job.

Also... sort by "median wage early career." Computer engineering and computer science are #1 and #2 at $90k and $87k. There's something important there too - most college graduates are not getting $100k/year jobs. That expectation of Big Tech wages out of college and turning one's nose up at a job that offers the median claiming that "it isn't competitive" may be contributing to the unemployment rate.

There isn't an existential crisis there. Most college graduates are finding jobs in the profession and computer science and engineering (from that data) are the highest paying college majors.

Oh good lord not that statistic again.

Left unstated is what jobs philosophy and art history majors take.

There's more computer scientists working in computer science than there are philosophy or art history majors working in philosophy or art history.

Cut juniors for AI

Save money

Invest in market share

Increase market cap

Hire the last remaining seniors at higher rates but only where needed

Great time to be a shareholder or staff level engineer. For everyone else, the ladder has been pulled.

I think that figure (haven’t verified it but assuming it’s true) isn’t complete. It hides who and where those people are - for example, I imagine art history skews towards higher ranked schools in the first place.

Such a correction was always going to happen. Coders always were the blue-collar workers of the 21st century, and capital ruthlessly optimises for profit. Where you once needed thousands of workers to run an assembly line, you now have dozens; where you once needed hundreds of programmers to run a big SaaS, you will now have a handful. It was always inevitable.

That doesn't mean we're all dead or anything - factory workers still exist, developer jobs will still exist. They'll just be far fewer than they used to be.

I think we're going to see a big scramble to pick up the pieces in a few years when a bunch of vibe-slopped houses of cards come crashing down. I imagine it will be like the demand for COBOL developers but on a much more massive scale.

Unemployment is based on the amount looking. I gotta say, how many philosophy students do you know actively looking for jobs? Now ask yourself why you think it's zero.

IEEE Spectrum is one of the many things that is always high on the HN front page, but is never worth reading.

IEEE has been putting their name on garbage journals and conferences since forever.

Good sleuthing, this really lowers the IEEE's quality in my eyes

Tragedy of the commons. What stops a company taking on the strong junior engineers you just invested time and resources into?

I think interest rates have a lot to do with that mindset. If you view a Jr engineer as a long term investment (in 18 months you get an SDE 2 who knows your business), that's much easier to justify when borrowing money is close to free.

A difficult degree in philosophy or english lit also does the same thing. Humans are amazing generalists, and when we practice thinking deeply, that skill transfers and allows us to pickup new domains.

Not many people are employed as computer scientists (they are mostly academics) compared to SWEs.

Ironic. I did both a humanities and a CS degree. The CS degree was filled with either south asian internationals or people who just want to make money. The rest were antisocial dudes. Humanities however was filled with young social women. The experiences I got from the latter was a huge ego and confidence boost.

> who built a product with actual paying users

How could this possibly signal competence? I think it just signals capital and free time.

> probability, calculus, linear algebra

All of these are mandatory in EU universities' CS programmes and are taught with relative rigor, particularly linear algebra. Calculus is called "Analysis" and usually covers all of Calc I plus a bit of Calc II.

In what way are those undergraduate degrees any less narrowing of scope than a CS undergraduate degree?

Isn't it normal to study mathematics in a computer science bachelor program in USA?

That country never ceases to astonish me lol.

To twist another saying: "Employers can be short-sighted for longer than I can delay my rent payment."

You're framing it like they're making a mistake, so if they are, yeah that's not good for you either.

Idk though, really seems like the "AI layoffs" are just corps shedding headcount bloat accumulated in 2020-23.

It would actually be good for us…

I never understood why software engineers were so excited about open source and teaching everyone to code.

Why aren‘t we more like doctors or lawyers?

Sure. Why give a shit about anything really.

Where do you draw the line on that attitude? Do you not care about global warming because in your lifetime, you're probably not going to experience an unsurvivable wet bulb temperature where you happen to live?

Because eventually you'll get to the point where you've too much work to do and there's not enough people to delegate it to.

Hope you like being overworked!