The Number Everyone Gets Wrong
Software engineering job postings are up 13.5% from 2023 to 2025.
So is the doomer narrative about job postings overblown? The fact is, AI isn’t killing software engineering — hiring is growing, share of total Software Engineering job postings is climbing.
Except it isn’t. Because here’s the other number: the equal-weighted average across 11 industry sectors shows SWE postings down 11.3% over the same period. Both numbers are simultaneously true.
How is that possible? Because in a classic case of Simpson’s paradox, two sectors — Technology and Financial Services — are so large and growing so fast that they completely mask what’s happening everywhere else.
We analyzed 45.4 million job postings across 37 months (January 2023 through January 2026), spanning 4,000+ companies and 11 industry sectors, sourced from the Revealera jobs database. The data tells a story that’s more nuanced — and more interesting — than either the doomers or the optimists are getting right.
The real signal isn’t SWE decline or SWE growth. It’s AI-SWE convergence. And it’s accelerating.
altdata•1h ago
So is the doomer narrative about job postings overblown? The fact is, AI isn’t killing software engineering — hiring is growing, share of total Software Engineering job postings is climbing.
Except it isn’t. Because here’s the other number: the equal-weighted average across 11 industry sectors shows SWE postings down 11.3% over the same period. Both numbers are simultaneously true.
How is that possible? Because in a classic case of Simpson’s paradox, two sectors — Technology and Financial Services — are so large and growing so fast that they completely mask what’s happening everywhere else.
We analyzed 45.4 million job postings across 37 months (January 2023 through January 2026), spanning 4,000+ companies and 11 industry sectors, sourced from the Revealera jobs database. The data tells a story that’s more nuanced — and more interesting — than either the doomers or the optimists are getting right.
The real signal isn’t SWE decline or SWE growth. It’s AI-SWE convergence. And it’s accelerating.