this post was submitted on 28 Apr 2026
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My Parent doesn't want me doing CS, or CE, because they feel the job market will disappear come 7 years. (lemmy.world)
submitted 3 days ago by aunchers@lemmy.world to c/cs_career_questions@programming.dev
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Basically Title.
I love CS, I love designing systems, programming, some cyber and math.
The problem is, I am due to admit into CS this year (4 year program). My Parent's will be funding a majority of it (~2 years, + RESP). And one of my parents, thinks CS won't have many jobs come 7 years?
Why? Because AI will take them all (or is more likely to take them all). That AI is expanding at a rapid pace, and they will slowly but surely take the hardware designing jobs, the programming jobs, and pretty much all the jobs except the administration ones. I have a poor time putting into words what I would like to do in the future (cause I love lots of things related to CS) but I say thing a bit on the technical side, and this parent says that if I cant explain it to them than I don't understand it and that they understand (more to me) what will happen to the market due to their age

I am not saying they're wrong to any of this by the way, I'm just looking for advice on if they're right, and if not, why?

I don't think I'll ever give up doing CS because its something I love with all my heart.
But if I'm not able to convince them, they want me to take a gap and get a different degree (in a less likely to be taken job).
I might be rambling here, but I am genuinely soooo lost.

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[โ€“] entwine@programming.dev 3 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Your parent has no idea what they're talking about. This is what happens when AI companies are given more money than they know what to do with; their marketing gets more and more unhinged, and eventually leaks out to the laymen.

I guess what might help you convince them is some perspective. It's true that LLMs can generate code, but what a laymen doesn't see is that the code they generate is in a language built by humans, using frameworks and tools built by humans, running on platforms built by humans, and distributed through infrastructure built by humans. Additionally, LLMs themselves are built by humans.

Could all of that be AI generated too? No. Anthropic already tried to build a browser and a compiler with Claude recently, and both projects failed spectacularly. The transformer model powering current LLMs has hit a wall; advancements have slowed down significantly in recent years, and the only thing that will get things going is another breakthrough. You're better off gambling your tuition at a casino than betting we'll have a breakthrough within 7 years (or worse, predicting the impact it will have on job markets)

And of course, the idea that an administrative role is safe is silly. There are already experiments to have LLMs run physical businesses on their own. If I had to make a prediction, I'd say business roles are much easier for an LLM to completely replace than engineering.

And finally, the bubble. LLMs today are affordable because of a frenzied market of degenerate gamblers; when the bubble pops (which will happen within 7 years), these AI companies will be forced to restructure or die. Anthropic charges $200/mo for their top models, and that has rate limits that people hit regularly. If Anthropic can't afford unmetered access at $200/mo while they're swimming in cash, then there's no way in hell those prices don't explode post-bubble. I'm not saying AI companies will die, but you and I aren't going to be able to use them.

Like @Newsteinleo@infosec.pub said, don't let them decide this for you. If they won't help pay your tuition, then get your own student loans, and go to a public university to save money.

[โ€“] Newsteinleo@infosec.pub 1 points 2 days ago

I just want to say student lending is one of the most predatory forms of lending we have in this county and you should avoid them. It is better go to a community college or take a gap year to work and build savings. Also College is not the only path to success and before spending a lot of money think about what success looks like to you.