For years, we heard about the tech talent shortage — that there was a glut of jobs and not enough bodies to fill them.
For students studying computer science, a bright future was on the horizon. Upon graduation, they could expect multiple job offers, high starting salaries and lots of perks, from free food and gym memberships to ping-pong tables in the office.
Fast-forward to now, and the tables have turned. Tech companies are laying off workers in droves. In some cases, they’re using AI to replace the workers that helped develop AI-based solutions.
Zach Taylor told The New York Times that, since graduating in 2023 with a computer science degree from Oregon State University, he’s applied to nearly 6,000 tech jobs — and it’s been one of “the most demoralizing experiences I have ever had to go through.”
He only landed 13 interviews and no job offers. Furthermore, he also couldn’t get a job at McDonald’s as a part time gig because of his “lack of experience.”
What’s going on?
Taylor is far from alone. Globally, more than 150,000 tech employees were laid off across 551 tech companies in 2024, according to independent layoffs tracker Layoffs.fyi. At the time of writing, 81,567 tech employees had been laid off to date in 2025 across 186 tech companies.
Major tech companies like Amazon, Google, Meta, Lenovo and Intel laid off sizable chunks of their workforce in 2024, which has continued into 2025. Microsoft, for example, announced in July that it’s cutting another 9,000 employees following a series of layoffs earlier this year.
According to the Canadian monthly layoffs update from Samfiru Tumarkin LLP, August 2025 saw layoffs at Cisco (impacting Canadian staff as part of global cuts), Oracle (affecting staff in Kitchener) and software firm Consensys (impacting Canadian employees).
While the idea behind AI was that it would automate manual tasks and help workers focus on more value-added activities, some workers fear it will outright replace them — and that’s already happening.
A publicly posted company memo by Amazon CEO Andy Jassy went into great detail about how AI would “make our jobs even more exciting and fun than they are today.” But it also said the company expects “this will reduce our total corporate workforce as we get efficiency gains from using AI extensively across the company.”
In July, Amazon cut its Amazon Web Services (AWS) cloud computing unit by at least hundreds, according to Reuters, though it isn’t clear exactly how many employees were let off (or if any were in Canada).
To top it off, low-code and no-code tools make it easier to complete simple coding jobs, even for non-technical users with little to no experience coding.
So how are students responding?
Many student coders are saying goodbye to those $165K tech jobs, according to The New York Times.
“I just graduated with a computer science degree, and the only company that has called me for an interview is Chipotle,” Manasi Mishra, a graduate of Purdue University, said in a TikTok video earlier this summer.
The NYT questioned more than 150 college students and recent grads from state schools and private universities about their experiences.
“Some said they had applied to hundreds, and in several cases thousands, of tech jobs at companies, nonprofits and government agencies. But many computing graduates said their monthslong job quests often ended in intense disappointment or worse: companies ghosting them,” the news outlet reported.
Tech jobs aren’t the only ones being impacted by this employment trend.
In Canada, youth unemployment “is the highest it has been in over a decade,” according to a study from Deloitte commissioned by the King’s Trust Canada. Youth unemployment reached a near-decade high of 14.4% in December 2024, and “a staggering 850,000 young people are not in jobs, training or school.”
More than a third of graduates believe their degree was “a waste of money,” according to research from Indeed Hiring Lab, with more than half (51%) of Gen Z respondents expressing remorse.
That’s because, according to the research, not only has the “college wage premium” plateaued, post-secondary education has become more expensive. The average student loan debt for a university graduate with a bachelor’s degree is more than $30,000, according to data from Statistics Canada.
What’s next?
Computer science graduates, however, have another problem: bad timing. Many universities are just now starting to train students on AI coding tools, Tracy Camp, executive director of the Computing Research Association, told The New York Times.
While generalists may be struggling to get a job, it’s anticipated that there will be growth in AI-related roles.
“Among AI-related occupations, data scientists account for 20% of all AI-related job postings, making it the most in-demand AI profession,” according to the OECD. “Other key roles include software developers, software engineers, database analysts, and computer engineers, who collectively make up approximately 45% of AI-related job postings.”
That’s because these jobs require domain knowledge and human judgment — both of which aren’t easily replicated by AI.
But it doesn’t mean recent grads have to go back to school (at least not for four years) and get further in debt. One option is micro-credentials, which are short, snack-sized, skill-based programs for specific competencies.
“While educational requirements are unlikely to vanish from job postings, growing support of skills-first hiring approaches is a clear sign for workers to invest in skills now, regardless of their education level,” according to the Indeed Hiring Lab report. “In other words, even college-educated workers may have to think about reskilling more going forward.”
Sources
1. The New York Times: Goodbye, $165,000 Tech Jobs. Student Coders Seek Work at Chipotle., by Natasha Singer (Aug 10, 2025)
2. Layoffs:
3. CNBC: Microsoft laying off about 9,000 employees in latest round of cuts, by Jordan Novet (Jul 2, 2025)
4. Samfiru Tumarkin LLP: Laid Off or Facing Layoffs in Canada? Your 2025 Legal Guide, by Lior Samfiru (Aug 29, 2025)
5. Amazon: Message from CEO Andy Jassy: Some thoughts on Generative AI, by Andy Jassy (Aug 29, 2025)
6. Reuters: Exclusive: Amazon’s AWS cloud computing unit cuts at least hundreds of jobs, sources say, by Greg Bensinger (Jul 17, 2025)
7. SAP: What is low-code/no-code application development?
8. King’s Trust Canada: Canada’s youth unemployment crisis
9. Indeed: Report: 51% of Gen Z Views Their College Degree as a Waste of Money, by Jocelyne Gafner (May 7, 2025)
10. Statistics Canada: Student debt from all sources, by province of study and level of study (Mar 22, 2024)
11. OECD: The state of AI jobs in Canada: What 12 million job postings reveal about hiring trends, by Diego Eslava, Fabio Manca and Caroline Paunov (Mar 18, 2025)
This article provides information only and should not be construed as advice. It is provided without warranty of any kind.