CS was already a popular bet among incoming college students, but the memory of the manic 2020-21 period have fuelled a vast flight of talent to CS majors, at least in my country. Everyone is convinced that the only way to make any real money fast is to learn how to code. The expectations are absurd - most expect to make doctor-tier salaries right after graduation (source: wife teaches at university).
By 2024, the steady drip of fresh CS graduates is going to turn into a flood.
An entire generation of teenagers saw the tech boom, the crypto boom, and the SPAC/IPO mani. Its going to color college major choices for years.
I almost feel like coding is currently what typing was 60 years ago. "Typist" isn't really a job anymore, but stenographer and transcriptionist are. Likewise, I think that coding needs to become something basically everyone can do a tiny bit of, but only a relatively smaller group do as their entire job.
almost anybody can be a coder but software engineering is super freakin' hard - and I only say this because I'm soon wrapping up my second decade of doing it. the amount of things you can't efficiently learn at school is staggering. I see young promising people focusing on 'tech stacks', 'deep learning', etc. hence missing the forest from the trees and think that it simply isn't possible to exit school as a competent software engineer. you have to really try to be one to become one and no school makes you do that. it's you.
On the other hand, it seems like technical proficiency might be going down with newer generations. Many were raised on smartphones and tablets where you just tap something and it does the thing. Devices nowadays abstract a lot of the underlying system away from the users, even to the point where apparently the newer generation struggles with the concept of files and directories.
Using a computer as a consumer is an entirely different skill set from making them. Just as most car owners barely know how their machine works besides stepping on an accelerator pedal and occasionally inserting a fuel nozzle.
Even before the smartphone revolution brought computing to global masses of all income levels, most users were not makers.
By 2024, the steady drip of fresh CS graduates is going to turn into a flood.
An entire generation of teenagers saw the tech boom, the crypto boom, and the SPAC/IPO mani. Its going to color college major choices for years.
In short: downward pressure on programmer wages.