The hottest college major [Computer Science] hit a wall. What happened?

After 15 years of nonstop growth, new federal data says computer science enrollments suddenly dipped—and the comments section went nuclear. One camp is mourning the end of the “easy mode” era, with garbawarb recalling the 2010–2020 boom when a bachelor’s in CS felt like a cheat code to the upper-middle class. Now, they say, entry-level jobs are tougher, the money-chasers are bailing, and the vibe is: no more guaranteed golden ticket. A second camp blames the doom-scroll effect: cedws says influencers have convinced Gen Z that AI killed coding jobs, even though plenty of companies still need people who understand software. Meanwhile, eleventen tossed a link like a mic drop—“receipts or it didn’t happen.”

Then came the fireworks. Alexfromapex thundered that outsourcing and wage suppression “destroyed” U.S. tech and left the country lagging. Others said… deep breath… every bubble cools, and this is just that. ModernMech reported from a massive NYC student fair that CS was the second-most asked-about major (right after mechanical engineering) and they literally ran out of brochures. Meme energy popped off: “CS isn’t dead, it’s de-influenced,” “AI didn’t take your job; hiring hoops did,” and “The pipeline’s fine; the vibes aren’t.” The only consensus? The gold-rush years are over. Whether this is a cliff or a speed bump—now that’s the fight everyone showed up for.