2026: The year entry level jobs are lost

Hiring isn't on the corporate agenda next year. Some two-thirds of CEOs at a recent gathering organized by the Yale School of Management said in 2026, they plan to either reduce headcount or keep their teams the same size. Hiring was only on the table for a third of the executives. The pattern underscores economic concerns and the idea that AI can take on more tasks.

Source: LinkedIn News

A highly controversial article was published recently in Compact Magazine, titled "The Lost Generation".

The article argues that young white men constitute a "lost generation" in professional fields due to the rapid institutionalization of DEI (diversity, equity, and inclusion) policies starting around 2014 and intensifying after 2020. These policies, the author claims, systematically excluded young white men from entry-level and mid-career opportunities.

This article isn't undeserving of criticism and controversy, but it's worth reading. The article speaks for itself, but I want to address the tech industry.

I'm going to use U.S. data, because Australia doesn't collect this data due to concerns about racism. And note these numbers are rough. Sources include Lightcast 2024 data, BLS and National Student Clearinghouse.

In 2023, there were an estimated 110,000 new graduates with computer science degrees, and 80,000 available entry level jobs.

That's an odds ratio of 1.375, assuming a normal distribution, the market is saturated at the junior level right now.

If we reduce this number, by two third to account for the fact CEOs are anticipating not hiring, then we have 26,000 entry level jobs available.

That's 4.2 candidates for each job.

Recent NCES/NSF data (e.g., 2023) breakdowns show 37–39% of CS graduates are white men.

ElectroIQ and CIO.com show white representation lower in new/entry-level hires due to DEI, often 25–35% for white men.

If we take the averages, 38% of CS graduates are white men, 30% of entry level CS hires are white men.

Multiply the candidates per job ratio by the representation of white men in the market and we get an odds ratio of 5.2.

Making an inference from the data, 5.2 white men are applying for every 1 graduate who gets the only entry level job.

That's quite the problem, and peoples expectations haven't adjusted yet.

I assume Australia is much worse, as our tech sector is much smaller, and our immigration numbers are much higher (proportionally).

I understand that to note this is offensive to some people.

In a market where you have 5 people applying for each job, and 1 cultural fit candidate, if you're really the psycopathic type you might say to a junior, well theres so much competition we can't afford to pay high salaries, despite never intending to hire the other 4.

The company ResumeBuilder ran a survey which found that 40% of HR departments had listed fake job postings, with 30% of companies at the time of data collection having an active fake job listing.

As many as 68% of recruiters surveyed claimed fake job postings have a “positive impact on revenue,” and 77% noticed an increase in employee productivity when ghost jobs were listed.

HR departments list fake jobs to boost their metrics, and to boost employee productivity. They use fear of replacement to increase output. 70% of hiring managers thought this was morally acceptable.

I might be wrong, but I don't see a future for white men in tech. This comes from the experience that things have not gotten better during my lifetime, economic and cultural circumstances have only gotten worse.

That's really unfortunate, because for the past few hundred years men from the european continent have led the innovation in tech and sciences. Hopefully the energy they have doesn't go to waste.

You can track the progress of my job searching on Google Sheets: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1XZWdcEjZnNdM1audt7xP_fMR94BpfVBoN7aTYwOM3Z8/edit?gid=0#gid=0