"A recent study confirms that Gen Z college graduates are entering one of the toughest job markets in recent history, with 58% still unemployed after earning their degrees. Students attribute much of the difficulty to the proliferation of artificial intelligence."
I do not doubt that many employers are deluding themselves into believing AI will render many entry-level jobs irrelevant. (Why this is wrong, I discuss below.) I would be curious to see the degree distribution. Degrees in psychology, English, history, political science, women's studies, gay studies, and generally victim studies, have not been paths to jobs of any decent pay for some years now. If a degree in one of these fields led to a job, it was often more a statement of the merits of the person than of the degree.
Why I doubt "clankers" (the new insult for robots and other non-meatware job takers) are a realistic replacement for humans. There are three fields in which I have employment experience: software engineer; employment agent; historian.
Many years ago, I worked for a builder of digital PABX systems (a type of telephony equipment). One of the new hires was a BSCS out of UC Davis. He was a very nice guy. When he found out that most of his job would involve writing functional specifications for programs, not programming, he was greatly surprised and disappointed. This is a task that is a bit harder than "write me an SQL program to extract these data elements from a database." Writing a detailed specification that meets the customer's needs involves quite a bit of discussion with humans that could benefit from AI, but someone with at least half a brain will need to do so.
Employment agent? Lots of persuading and discussions with humans in areas that are more feelings than logic (at least to make money reliably).
Historian? Writing history is a fundamentally creative act. AI may be a useful research tool.
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