My prediction is that to be competitive, companies will eventually need to rely on AI-produced code to some extent or risk being slower and less efficient than competitors. It would be like not using email or messaging and only using snail mail for all written communication.

But AI is nowhere close to perfect now, and will have flaws for a long time. Having AI write code is like having a so-so junior engineer, who can complete the task, but makes mistakes, so needs their code reviewed closely. And is unable to architect anything complex, that still needs to be done by the leads/managers/senior folks.

So more and more of the simple, low complexity coding tasks will be done by AI, while the value of importance of senior engineers will be as high as ever, since they need to oversee the AI's outputs.

What I wonder is how junior engineers, who will be starting their careers out as more expensive or weaker coders to AI, will get the experience necessary to become the senior engineers that need to guide/review the AI's work?