Hey! Today, I read a very interesting paper, a Harvard study from August 2025 titled “Generative AI as Seniority-Biased Technological Change”, about the effects of the AI on job market, and it is more than what I thought. I cannot wait to share with you.
We’ve all heard the warnings: “AI is coming for our jobs.” But what if the real story is more subtle and has already begun? The paper suggests the AI revolution isn’t about mass layoffs. Instead, it’s about the silent disappearance of the very first job you were supposed to get.
The study provides compelling evidence that companies adopting AI aren’t firing people; they’re just not hiring them. Specifically, they’re freezing out the next generation of workers.
Here are the four key takeaways you need to know:
1. The Great Divergence: Junior Jobs Vanish, Senior Jobs Don’t 📉
Using data from nearly 285,000 U.S. firms, researchers found a dramatic shift starting in early 2023. As the chart below shows, junior and senior employment grew at similar rates for years. But beginning in mid-2022, a clear divergence emerges: senior employment continues to climb while junior employment flattens and then begins to fall.
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In companies actively integrating AI, junior-level employment fell sharply.
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Meanwhile, in those same companies, senior-level employment continued to rise.
The career ladder is being pulled up from the bottom. While experienced professionals remain in demand, the entry points are starting to close.2. It’s a Hiring Freeze, Not a Firing Spree 🚫
This isn’t a story about pink slips. The study found the decline in junior headcount is driven almost entirely by a
massive slowdown in hiring. Companies are using AI to automate the routine tasks once reserved for recent graduates, so they’re simply not posting those entry-level jobs anymore.
The surprising twist? For the junior employees already inside these companies, opportunities may be getting better. The research found that
promotions from junior to senior roles actually increased at AI-adopting firms. The message is clear: once you’re in, you’re valued. But getting in the door is becoming the biggest challenge of all.
3. This Isn’t Just a Tech Problem 🏢
While you might expect this trend in Silicon Valley, the study found the effects are widespread. In fact, the sector that saw the
largest reduction in junior hiring was wholesale and retail trade, where adopting firms slashed entry-level hiring by roughly 40%. The chart below illustrates that while senior hiring was mostly unaffected, junior hiring took a significant hit across multiple major industries.
This shows that AI’s impact on junior roles is spreading across the entire economy.4. The “Middle-Tier” Graduate Squeeze 🎓
Who is most at risk? It’s not who you might think. The study revealed a striking “U-shaped” pattern based on university prestige:
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Most Affected: Graduates from “strong” and “solid” mid-tier universities faced the steepest job declines. They are expensive enough to be worth replacing with AI, but their credentials aren’t “elite” enough to make them indispensable.
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Less Affected: Graduates from elite, top-tier schools and those from lower-prestige institutions were better shielded.
This chart clearly shows the dip in the middle, where graduates from Tier 2 and Tier 3 schools experienced the sharpest relative drop in employment.
This suggests AI is hollowing out the broad “upper-middle” segment of the entry-level talent pool.Why This Matters for Everyone
This trend has profound implications. For young people, it threatens to remove the first rung of the career ladder, making it harder than ever to gain the experience needed for upward mobility and lifetime wage growth. For companies, it raises a critical question: If you stop hiring juniors, where will your senior leaders of tomorrow come from?
The age of AI isn’t just changing how we work—it’s changing who gets to work in the first place.