Companies are in bidding wars to hire software engineers.

I fired up Claude to evaluate why tech is laying off programmers but at the same time hiring software engineers? WTF?

I've heard many tech companies and the Mag 7 are laying off workers. Plus many computer programmers are losing their jobs? Examine the attached story and evaluate why the demand is up for software engineers. Why are there fortunes so different. Am I missing something?

You’re not wrong. Both things are true at once, and the article only shows half of the picture. “Software engineers” have split into separate labor markets that are moving in opposite directions.

1. Layoffs and hiring are hitting different people

The cuts are concentrated among junior and routine coding roles. Stanford’s 2026 AI Index found employment for developers aged 22–25 is down about 20% since 2022, while ages 35–49 are up 9%. Indeed Hiring Lab reported in July 2026 that senior postings rose 13.5% from January 2025 while entry-level postings fell 6.3%.

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Job titles show the same split. BLS data shows overall programmer employment fell 27.5% between 2023 and 2025, but software developer employment, a distinct and more design-oriented classification, fell only 0.3%. So “programmers are losing their jobs” is largely accurate if you mean people who write code to someone else’s spec. That is exactly the work AI tools now do well. Boilerplate code, well-documented API integrations, simple bug fixes and unit tests are precisely the tasks AI code generation handles, so one senior engineer with AI can now do what used to take a small team with juniors.

The article itself points to what’s scarce: Randstad says the hard part is finding people who can turn AI investment into business results, especially in system architecture and AI orchestration. That’s a senior skill set.

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2. Tech companies and banks are on opposite sides of the AI trade

This is the main reason their fortunes diverge. The Mag 7 are sellers of AI. They’re spending enormous sums on data centers and chips, and cutting headcount helps offset that capital spending. They also over-hired heavily in 2021–22. For them, AI replaces engineers.

Banks, insurers and hospital systems are buyers of AI. They have decades of legacy systems, heavy regulation and messy data. Getting value from AI means integrating it into their own operations, and that takes engineers who understand the business. For them, AI creates engineering work. That’s what Randstad’s CEO meant when he said the money that once flowed into the tech industry is now moving to companies that want to capture gains from AI.

The two trends also feed each other. Among non-tech organizations Randstad surveyed, 55% are hiring in the wake of tech-company job cuts, and in the U.S. 70% are absorbing talent from the tech sector. Some of the “demand” is simply laid-off Oracle or Amazon engineers being rehired at JPMorgan or a health system.

3. Why banks and healthcare pay more

A few likely reasons:

• Domain knowledge. An engineer who understands trading compliance or HIPAA is much harder to find than a generic developer.

• Risk. A bad deployment at a bank or hospital can mean regulatory penalties or patient harm, so they pay up for experienced people.

• Who they’re hiring. If they’re mostly hiring seniors, their median salary will look high next to a tech company’s mix of junior and senior staff.

4. Reasons to read the article skeptically

Salary vs. total pay. The 13–17% “premium” may be cash pay only. Big tech pays a large share of compensation in stock. A bank paying 13% more in salary may still pay less overall than Google or Meta, so check whether this compares like with like.

The source. Randstad is a staffing firm. “Talent demand is surging” is good for its business.

Intentions, not hires. “86% of organizations increasing tech headcount” is a survey of what 1,100 executives say they plan to do, collected in August. Job postings aren’t hires either. One industry analysis found companies advertising junior roles but filling them with seniors: actual junior hiring dropped 73% while postings rose 47%.

AI-skill listings. A fivefold increase in postings asking for AI skills partly reflects employers adding “AI” to ordinary job descriptions.

The bottom line

What you’re missing is that demand hasn’t risen for software engineers as a group. It has shifted:

• From tech companies to companies adopting AI.

• From writing code to designing systems and directing AI tools.

• From junior engineers to experienced ones.

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Experienced engineers with industry knowledge are doing well. New graduates and routine coders are struggling. The longer-run risk, which several analysts raise, is that if companies stop hiring juniors, they’ll have no pipeline of senior engineers in five years.

Banks and healthcare firms are outbidding tech companies for software engineers

Randstad research finds banks pay software engineers a median 13% premium and healthcare firms up to 17% more

By Cris Tolomia, Quartz Media

Updated October 29, 2026

Randstad reported in its 2026 tech talent research that banks pay software engineers a median 13% premium over tech companies, while healthcare and life sciences firms pay up to 17% more.

Non-tech companies are outbidding tech firms for software talent while listings that call for AI skills have multiplied more than fivefold in the last 12 months, Randstad said. Among the non-tech organizations it surveyed, 55% are hiring staff in the wake of job cuts at technology companies.

In the U.S., 70% of non-tech organizations are absorbing talent from the tech sector, 15 percentage points above the global benchmark, according to a Randstad US release. Randstad said banking and financial services and healthcare are attracting up to three times more tech professionals into digital roles than pure-play IT firms gain in return.

Hiring demand is growing overall. Randstad said 86% of organizations globally are increasing their tech headcount, and 93% of U.S. organizations are doing so.

Randstad CEO Sander van 't Noordende told CNBC's "Squawk Box Europe" on Thursday that the non-tech employers see a payoff in AI. "These businesses see massive potential in AI, realizing business cases that they were not able to realize before," he said. Van 't Noordende said the money that once poured into the tech industry is now moving to companies that want to capture gains from AI.

Michael Morris, global head of platform and talent at Randstad Digital, said in a statement that the challenge for U.S. employers is finding people who can turn AI investment into business results, particularly in system architecture and AI orchestration.

The research draws on responses from 1,100 senior business and technology leaders in 11 markets, gathered in the first half of August 2026, along with an analysis of more than 20 million job ads and the profiles of about 100 million candidates, Randstad said.

Tech companies have been cutting software roles. Oracle $ORCL -3.45%'s September layoffs fell hardest on software developers, engineers and managers in its cloud infrastructure division. The company shed roughly 21,000 positions, about 13% of its workforce, over the fiscal year ended May 31, 2026.