Will AI leave engineers unemployed: New study shows unexpected results

Recently, the rapid development of AI technologies has caused serious concern among many professionals, especially software developers. Many predicted that AI would learn to write code and replace engineers. However, recent statistics show that these assumptions are not being justified in practice; on the contrary, the engineering profession is proving to be the most resilient of all sectors. This is reported by Techcrunch.com reports.

The results of a large-scale study conducted by the venture capital firm SignalFire show that hiring rates in engineering remained significantly more stable in 2025 compared to other sectors. Researchers analyzed the career paths of millions of employees across more than 80 million companies and reached an unexpected conclusion: AI is not pushing engineers out, but rather increasing the demand for them.

The situation in large tech companies

Although overall hiring at major tech giants has decreased by 25 percent compared to 2019, this figure has dropped by only 11 percent for engineering positions. According to SignalFire data, engineers accounted for 55 percent of all new hires in 2025 at the world's 12 largest Tech Majors, including giants like Alphabet, Meta, Apple, Amazon, Microsoft, NVIDIA, and Tesla.

For comparison, this figure was 46 percent in 2019. This means that even during periods of economic hardship and staff reductions, companies are placing greater emphasis on retaining technical specialists and attracting new ones. In startup projects, the situation is even more positive — newly established companies have hired 7 percent more engineers than in 2019.

Why didn't the predictions come true?

The consulting firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas cited AI as the primary reason for layoffs in May. Theoretically, because AI tools accelerate the coding process, one engineer should be able to do the work previously performed by several people. But in practice, these technologies have become an additional tool for solving more complex tasks rather than replacing human labor.

Asher Bantock, head of research at SignalFire, noted that if AI could truly replace engineers, engineering staff would have been the first to be drastically reduced during the current wave of layoffs. However, the numbers prove the opposite. Currently, the number of engineers is growing faster than in all other functional areas.

Even though Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei, one of the leaders in the AI field, warned last year that AI could eliminate half of white-collar jobs within five years, the company's head of economics, Peter McCrory, admitted that the negative impact of AI on the labor market is not yet being felt. The sustained demand for highly qualified developers in the Uzbekistan market is also part of this global trend.