AI job openings continued to climb this year – Tech Brew

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Even amid hand-wringing around the state of AI hype, companies are still looking to hire more AI-savvy workers.

Indeed data shows AI-related job postings now make up around 2.2% of all US listings on the site, having steadily climbed from a low of 1.6% last summer, when tech companies scaled back on hiring. The company’s report this week also said that AI-related jobs now make up around 22% of software development roles for hire, an increase from 19% in June of last year.

The report comes as AI remains a solid bright spot in an otherwise turbulent time for tech workers. Startup funding is in the midst of a two-year slump, despite money still pouring into AI upstarts, per Crunchbase’s most recent report, and Meta and Intel both reportedly held widespread layoffs this week.

“What we’re finding is that there’s a higher demand for some of the more niche technologies, the ones that are more focused on AI, GenAI, that’s where we’re seeing a lot more of that demand, where there’s not enough skill sets out there to fill those roles,” Linsey Fagan, senior talent strategy advisor at Indeed, told Tech Brew.

Here are some other big takeaways from Indeed’s 2024 Tech Talent report:

• AWS skills have seen the most growth in demand from employers since last year. Familiarity with PyTorch, Rust, and TensorFlow had the highest rate of growth among advertised jobs.
• Amid the growth of generative AI, around 44% of tech workers feel “high” or “very high” pressure to upskill, and 35% feel “moderate” pressure.
• Around one-third of tech workers surveyed did not have a bachelor’s degree. Indeed’s report authors suggest this means companies might be missing out on talent by requiring degrees, though the number of job postings with the prerequisite has declined among tech employers in the last five years, the report said.
• More than one-third of tech workers are concerned with layoffs in the next year, and 40% say they would likely be impacted.
• While only 22% of tech workers have noncompete clauses, 71% of them say they are more likely to look for other work if the Federal Trade Commission (FTC)’s noncompete ban is allowed to take effect. A federal judge struck down the rule in August, but the FTC has vowed to continue to fight the noncompetes, and several states have banned or restricted them.

Overall, tech jobs are expected to grow at twice the rate of the US workforce more broadly in the next decade, despite the industry’s current flux. And while openings are lower than pre-pandemic levels, the average investment per tech job on Indeed has increased in the past two years, the company said.