Outsourcing has been a big headwind for CS for some time now, compounded by massive supply growth in labor as everyone & their mother rushed into CS. The challenges in CS as demand shrunk for past few years seemed cyclical, but increasingly there will be a structural element of constrained hiring going forward in CS as we just need less programmers due to AI
I had always felt a little stupid from 2018-2022 going into LO AM (biggest irony in the world is myself so many other folks who analyze businesses for a living entered a clearly melting ice cube) compared to CS which seemed to have a multi-decade gold rush opportunity ahead. That is, until AI came along. To be clear 1) I don't believe that 50% of coders are going to be put out of work. I feel massively vindicated (for something that was totally out of my control tbh) for not entering CS
The safest risk-adjusted path would have been medicine -- particularly in some specialized field (not PCP) where you are interacting with patients (not radiology). Maybe cardio / neuro / derm / etc. HC was a consensus long as a career path, and not to say everything is rosy there (decline of private practices, falling Medicare reimbursements, etc) but it's a solid risk adjusted $300-500k a year annuity you can clip for decades. But eh, can't win em all. On legal side -- this was messed up well before AI with a massive oversupply of lawyers, with corporate law completely screwed up (even at Partner level you are grinding 70+hrs a week decades into the practice). Also a terrible area to be an associate right now. Glad I didn't do this
Feel sorry for a lot of these coders who are actually hardworking / passionate about their careers, but on the flip side the ones who coasted at 20hrs a week just resting and vesting....I'm not exactly going to cry a river of these folks. The LinkedIn professional coding / Project Manager influencers are the worst, ngl seeing these guys get wrecked is hilarious
All to say, high finance comparatively seems like while not the best risk-reward (that's probs medicine), definitely one of the top ones (maybe #2/#3). We may be disrupted too (I think juniors are first to get hit here over next 5-10yrs, though seniors with 5+yrs exp should be shielded for materially longer) but for now, it feels much better to not be the first ones on the chopping block
Hot take from someone whose job is a mix of what you do and CS: Even though the market has reverted a bit, a good CS job is still easier to obtain, and easier to hold than a good finance job.
Even after layoffs, there is still an order of magnitude more people as SWE/DS/Etc. in the big tech companies vs front office banking, hedge funds, etc. People who work at a lower-tier companies in tech have a much easier chance jumping to a better company since the work is the same, whereas it's hard to jump between low tier and high tier finance jobs. And the work is much easier. Tech work has a bunch of code reviews and other red tape so unless you're working at a startup where these requirements are relaxed, your hours will never be as bad as in finance. Whereas if a senior person at your firm wants an excel or a powerpoint there is no excuse for not getting it done quickly. Outsourcing is just a cope people use when they can't find a job.
Guess you are a quant?
I think you are totally right that a good CS jobs is easier to get on a good finance job -- that was true 5yrs ago and it's true today. But the gap has massively closed. And the direction of travel is that it will close further
I also am not an expert on tech hours, but I am seeing way more people who used to work 30hrs a week now working ~45hrs a week. And that is ticking up. Will the end state be lower hours vs finance hours? Sure. But big diff in the future of a finance guy working 60hrs a week vs. tech counterpart working 50hrs a week than that same finance guy working 60hrs a week vs. tech couterpart who used to work 30hrs per week
This is some next level cope. "They used to work 30 hours a week and now work 45, clearly that means things are worse for them than me, who works 60 hours a week!"
Why tf does this argument of CS vs finance even matter? You can go work in tech as a finance major, and you can work in finance as a CS major. It's 2026, and people are still talking about ts
Everyone with 5 yoe who isn’t dumb still makes 300k-500k. AI is only making good programmers 10x more effective. Back office and customer support roles will be automated long before ai. People don’t code now they just shout at Claude Code. It truly is a golden period.
Counterpoint: Most people who fell victim to the big tech layoffs took a haircut in comp, and in most cases were not laid off because of personal performance (being "dumb"). I know plenty - they are still doing well and are crushing it at their new firms, but they aren't getting big tech money anymore.
Meh there’s plenty of hot startups paying 250k base and a lot of smaller public companies still paying 300k plus. Yeah you aren’t ripping 600k working 15 hours a week at google anymore, but the zirp pay and work of the past ten years was truly ridiculous.
It's fair point to say that if you are a sr. you have not really been affected by this. I guess my post is mainly geared towards juniors (sub-5yrs exp) or those who will enter as juniors. Likewise the outlook is dimming for those with 5-10yrs
Now if you have 15+yrs YOE and are good, you will be fine. Good exp, good network hopefully, etc
Fundamentally disagree but that’s what makes a market. Like how so many good tech marketplace stocks are getting killed by AI along with SAAS in an age where distribution matters more than ever.
Seniors will only have more operating leverage and be more highly paid in the future. Absolute numbers 5 years from now of senior engineering jobs probably decrease but average salary per engineer increases.
I disagree with your timing - in my exp, tech folks with 2 years (relatively cheap but doesn't need any extensive training) are doing the best.
Tech has a stereotype of discriminating against old folks - what I can say empirically is that people with 15+ YOE at my work are absolutely getting screwed over comp wise. Though it is partially their fault as they came of age before the obsession with technical interviews and stuff and most likely are too lazy to learn.
Learn to coal computer nerds
D&C
Working on an Outsourcing / AI consulting project with our off-shore team and on-shore Product Managers. The output of the work overseas (and some on-shore H1B types) is absolutely laughable. I'm genuinely surprised that clients pay for this quality.
This is what I’ve been hearing from friends in big tech where their teams were outsourced. The directors I’ve known are trying to make an argument to bring back the work to the U.S.
Yeah it feels like a blood bath in the tech industry right now. Although I dislike my tech consulting job, I can't deny the fact I likely have better job security than most. We offer a lot of outsourced cheap labor within our multinational organization which clients clearly like and at least in my consulting group, the pipeline of potential projects / deals has been red hot since Q4 '24. Ton of new hires and we're still understaffed.
Will be the devil's advocate here. Did a dual degree with data science and didn't code much after I graduated. Ever since Opus 4.5 came out, I've been heavily ripping the IDE again. Wish I spent more of the last few years continuing my interest in code so that I can be more in the loop and stay on top of everything going on. Find myself relearning simple things like git, python, APIs, etc that CS majors would all be 10x better than me with. Lucky that I spent enough time in it where I feel like I can come out ahead on using AI tools in finance (relative to peers), but I suspect anyone in finance with a technical background will come out notably ahead. With dev times coming down so hard, being able to understand CS concepts and apply them to AI and finance together will provide so much career leverage imo.
When I was in finance/banking, a lot of the managers and above heavily emphasized the need for internal (locally) talent of people who can combine both tech and finance together.
They’d easily choose a CS grad for analyst roles and teach them the finance aspect during the training period.
As an older finance guy who has been 'cycled out' what could I retrain to?
Tons of things -- corp fin, operating roles at a late stage startup like Databricks, institutional asset allocation, IR, etc. Depends on your interest but it's very doable
Wouldn’t operating roles be managed by internal hiring/juniors?
Maybe you could increase your skill set by learning python or machine learning / stats.
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