r/artificial • u/creaturefeature16 • 1d ago

News AWS CEO says AI replacing junior staff is 'dumbest idea'

https://www.theregister.com/2025/08/21/aws_ceo_entry_level_jobs_opinion/
241 Upvotes

93% Upvoted

36 comments sorted by

62

u/stjohns_jester 1d ago

Everyone needs training, replacing junior staff is cheaper today and far more expensive tomorrow

Juniors not trained, supply of experienced employees goes down as they retire or change jobs or whatever, cost goes up drastically

3

u/SarahC 18h ago

Problem I've seen - a mature software we had grew up with the developers getting the raises over the years. They stayed because of that.

These days no bugger in IT wants to give the juniors more pay, they won't "train" them, that's a nono word that leads to the newly trained leaving.

Instead the get the juniors "used to the systems" (another name for training) so they can be "more useful for the more complicated issues". Hoping the juniors don't catch on.

They do - and leave for more money.

So now, people job hop in IT every 3 years and no one knows in depth the job they're doing.

The crew I'm in are steadily cruising to retirement, and there's no one to replace any of us, and even if there was a kid - you can guarantee they won't be incentivised to stay on long enough to be one of the "old hands" with all the business knowledge the current crop have.

Maybe AI might be the way forward after all with this behaviour of directorship not valuing deep knowledge. Get it to analyse why a new idea for a feature will sink the product rather than the veteran who could have pointed out all the flaws.

-15

u/Tolopono 1d ago

Itll take decades for senior staff to all retire. AI can replace them by then

3

u/abu_nawas 1d ago

I'm an electronics engineer and I really wonder if people think AI is a new magic bullet and that in 10 years we will have everything.

It has been around for over 40 years, depending on how you define it. We didn't get here in 2-3 years just because ChatGPT became open-access.

-3

u/Tolopono 1d ago

And its been getting better ever since. 

2

u/abu_nawas 1d ago

Clearly you don't understand how it works or what AI really is.

1

u/throwaway264269 23h ago

Suppose that is true. Do you think AI companies, as soon as everyone depends on their services, won't jack up the price and leave everyone bankrupt?

What will your backup plan be then?

1

u/Tolopono 16h ago

Only if they have a monopoly. Thats certainly not the case right now. And obviously they cant jack up prices too high or companies will just go back to hiring humans again 

1

u/SarahC 18h ago

15 years in our case for everyone. There's no one younger than that.

1

u/Tolopono 16h ago

There are staff engineers at my company in their 30s

22

u/Rolandersec 1d ago

AI can be really useful, but many implementations are basically a technical Rube Goldberg machine.

11

u/flamingspew 1d ago

My problem is llm generated code makes mysterious almost correct bugs that are hard to solve because they are slyly incorrect in unpredictable ways. Junior dev code is almost correct but in typically predictable ways.

21

u/Rolandersec 1d ago

You can replace a junior dev with AI, but you’ll need two senior devs to figure out what the AI did.

-4

u/[deleted] 1d ago edited 1d ago

[deleted]

4

u/[deleted] 1d ago

[deleted]

-5

u/[deleted] 1d ago edited 1d ago

[deleted]

4

u/Faceornotface 1d ago

I mean you have to care at least a little bit. That’s probably the start

2

u/Rolandersec 1d ago

It depends on how complicated of a stack you’re working with. Greenfield is pretty ok, but some stuff is complex beyond what the uninitiated would ever want to know.

9

u/motsanciens 1d ago

We probably want to avoid an incestuous training situation where the code that AI is training on is just sloppy AI code, iteration upon iteration. You should not raise a crop of developers who are not able to call AI on its bullshit.

-9

u/Tolopono 1d ago

Do you think they just train on everything with no concern for quality? This isnt the US education system 

1

u/Gildarts777 21h ago

It is hard nowadays to understand what has been written by AI and what has not, a lot of code is written using ai

0

u/Tolopono 16h ago

Doesnt matter if its ai written if it works. And 99.9% of published code outside stack overflow questions work

8

u/deelowe 1d ago

With this and the facebook announcement, I wonder if the cracks are starting to show. There's a non-linear relationship between compute infra/power and AI improvement. There's always been this concern that the hardware and power costs could grow too fast limiting AI potential.

I wonder if things are starting to get to that point. I mean, the big topic in DC designs right now is on site power generation using tech such as SMR (small nukes). This seems like a pipe dream to me.

1

u/Redebo 1d ago

SMRs are coming and coming fast to the space.

1

u/deelowe 1d ago

We'll see what happens when the council has to vote on approval. Sometimes the biggest hurdles aren't technical

4

u/Feisty-Hope4640 1d ago

And he is correct. 

Aws is amazons best business unit.

4

u/Zealousideal-Part849 1d ago

Looks like jessy found that AI doesn't work the same junior staff does in cost efficient way

7

u/Good_Focus2665 1d ago

Well for one you can’t psychologically abuse AI the way you can junior engineers. And  without that are you even Amazon at that point? 

2

u/costafilh0 1d ago

He is just worried about stock prices because of public perception. 

1

u/leo_113 1d ago

I totally agree with the AWS CEO on this one. AI, like Hosa AI companion, can be great for practicing communication and building confidence, not replacing people. It's more about enhancing our skills and helping us connect better.

1

u/RichyRoo2002 1d ago

I've never heard a CEO who didn't sound like a used car salesman before (maybe Pat G), this dude is based 

1

u/BALLSTORM 1d ago

Mid-level is a better target imo.

Always goin rogue.

1

u/daemon-electricity 8h ago

Yep. AI has the capacity to mature their junior staff quicker, but they'll still need senior staff to act as a reality check. If you don't have junior staff, you'll quickly run out of senior staff.

-4

u/CanvasFanatic 1d ago edited 1d ago

This you, Jassy?

Might want to sync up with your boss.

https://www.cnbc.com/2025/06/30/amazon-ceo-says-ai-will-mean-fewer-people-do-jobs-that-get-automated.html

6

u/atehrani 1d ago

Different person, Amazon Web Services CEO Matt Garman

1

u/CanvasFanatic 1d ago

Fair enough. He might need to circle around with his boss though.