They graduated from Stanford. Due to AI, they can't find a job

[Zorro]

A Stanford software engineering degree used to be a golden ticket. Artificial intelligence has devalued it to bronze, recent graduates say.

The elite students are shocked by the lack of job offers as they finish studies at what is often ranked as the top university in America.

When they were freshmen, ChatGPT hadn’t yet been released upon the world. Today, AI can code better than most humans.

Top tech companies just don’t need as many fresh graduates.

“Stanford computer science graduates are struggling to find entry-level jobs” with the most prominent tech brands, said Jan Liphardt, associate professor of bioengineering at Stanford University. “I think that’s crazy.”

https://www.latimes.com/business/story/2025-12-19/they-graduated-from-stanford-due-to-ai-they-cant-find-job

[tanyev]

1. Top executives CLAIM that "AI can code better than most humans".

They desperately want it to be true, and maybe someday it really will. But my code-writing husband, who is currently being aggressively pushed by his employer to use AI “assistance” is furious that everything now takes longer because he has to correct so many AI mistakes.

[anciano]

2. Historically, new technologies have always affected

some existing occupations, but new skills and career opportunities have invariably replaced the older ones. This is not an unusual situation.

[somsai]

3. My kid just got raised to officially be called a software engineer

He had finished all his classes except one at a fairly selective engineering school. He'd been working as some other job designation. Now he's finished and making slightly over median for the area. Median for beginning software engineers is a heck of a lot less than it was 5 years ago.

He also uses AI all the time, just as they did in school. AI is a tool, it can save hours of work and better versions are coming out all the time. He can also use AI to learn new concepts in things that aren't writing code but necessary for the particular code he is writing.

The school my kid went to is known for being a grind, they also don't grade on a curve, ever. Graduates have a reputation for working hard.

Stanford is still a very highly rated school, but they've had weird things going on and if I were hiring I'd look closely. The standards for admittance for quite a few schools varied widely for a couple of years. Some students for sure weren't up snuff yet were admitted and passed anyway.
Often employers test applicants, and for hiring people to earn big salaries they have long tests, often on things that can't be done, they want to see what methods are used to try to solve the problem. I don't think we can ever have too many engineers. I know people who got mechanical engineering or other types of engineering degrees, who have spent their careers writing code. Engineers are good at all kinds of things.

Amongst our ethnicity many children seek STEM degrees. We don't know of any other CS major who got hired. Things will turn around. Excess engineers means companies can hire more of them, and they make even more and newer products, requiring more engineers. We will use computers more as time goes on, not less.