Artificial intelligence as good as a mid-level software engineer at Meta, Zuckerberg says, pushing the alarm button on developer roles.

OpenAI also has added a few details on how to implement the model for this task in OpenAI’s GitHub repository. Although we cannot include the trials we carried out here, it is worth mentioning that all experiments used one of the largest commercially available GPU clusters in the world.

The Meta boss, Mark Zuckerberg, has further built up fears about the future of developers’ jobs as he highlights that the current generation of AI at his company is already achieving that of mid-level software engineers. On the Joe Rogan podcast, he laid out his views about AI and what it lays in store for the future coding landscape.

The AI at Meta and other tech companies will cover 2025 most of the work done nowadays by mid-level tech developers who write code. This will bring about a transformation in the way software companies view software development.

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Artificial intelligence as good as a mid-level software engineer at Meta, Zuckerberg says, pushing the alarm button on developer roles.

January 14, 2025

One day we’ll all be able to write all the code in our apps and the AI that powers them and have AI engineers instead of human engineers do it. Business Insider cited mid-level software engineers at Meta now drawing an estimated median salary of $200,000, earnings which an AI has the potential of dropping significantly.

Zuckerberg’s reference to other tech giant leaders like Google and IBM is coming at a time when initiatives utilizing AI are being undertaken. Three of the big ICIT players of the future heavily investing in AI have similar initiatives to Zuckerberg’s. It is Sundar Pichai, who has said publicly, “25 per cent of any given code at Google is refined and generated from machine learning.” Manpower is needed for the final bits as the proportion continues to grow. Meanwhile, IBM’s president, Arvind Krishna, could possibly envisage 30 per cent of the company’s back-office roles being replaced by self-taught machines in 2023. In all areas, there is concern that an increasing number of jobs may disappear forever.

Are human engineer job tasks on the edge?

The recent Facebook announcement of Mark Zuckerberg and the latest statement came from Google, saying that artificial intelligence is all set to complete code-writing tasks that lead to a change in the role of human engineers and, quite possibly, a decline in what is coding by job as we normally would know it. There is an increased need to spend most of one’s time in higher-level problem-solving and AI-endorsed coding, rather than rote tasks. As AI becomes more widespread within technology workflows, it might be that junior to entry-level coding positions would be few, making new developers redefine their career trajectories.

Nevertheless, engineers were not about to close the shop. AI’s emerging relevance in coding could elevate the job to be more strategy-clinical and creative instead. While it is impossible to replace human engineers, their services are essential as AI will not be able to process complex issues on its own. With the automation of routine duties, the importance of these core competencies grows and generates the highest value for skills complementing AI. 

That company stopped hiring people.

In its AI journey, Meta is not alone; Klarna, a major fintech company, has also taken strides toward the integration of AI-driven automation into its processes, bringing about a decrease in the workforce to 20% less over the year-long period. The CEO of Klarna, Sebastian Siemiatkowski, has observed that AI has taken over virtually every task normally performed by the employee, opening doors to a future dominated by AI. 

The reduction in the company’s workforce from 4,500 to 3,500 took place over that period naturally, according to the CEO. This 20 per cent attrition is common in technology companies.