{"id":627,"date":"2026-05-25T13:04:32","date_gmt":"2026-05-25T13:04:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/americanhomejournals.com\/?p=627"},"modified":"2026-05-25T13:04:32","modified_gmt":"2026-05-25T13:04:32","slug":"dad-jeans-big-paychecks-hardware-engineers-are-winning-the-ai-boom","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/americanhomejournals.com\/?p=627","title":{"rendered":"Dad jeans, big paychecks: hardware engineers are winning the AI boom"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

For decades in Silicon Valley, hardware engineers were the overlooked nerds of tech. They wore dad jeans, clunky tennis shoes, and quietly designed chips while software engineers soaked up the glamour, stock grants, and sky-high salaries.<\/p>\n

Read more An Anthropic employee built an AI wedding site. Then an angry emoji went viral.<\/a><\/p>\n

The AI boom is flipping that script. <\/p>\n

According to Levels.fyi data, hardware engineer compensation at the entry and mid-career levels is growing two to three times faster than software pay. <\/p>\n

Companies building the physical infrastructure of AI (Nvidia, Broadcom, SpaceX, and others) are scrambling for talent. Suddenly, the people working with actual silicon, power systems, and cooling gear are becoming some of tech’s hottest, and best-paid, hires.<\/p>\n

Read more Jensen Huang is really leaning into his street-food influencer era<\/a><\/p>\n

Sign up for BI’s Tech Memo newsletter <\/em><\/strong>here. Reach out to me via email at <\/em><\/strong>abarr@businessinsider.com.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Read more I paid off $150,000 in student loan debt in 16 months. Here are the sacrifices I made and the jobs I worked to become debt-free.<\/a><\/p>\n<\/section>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

AI is making hardware engineers some of tech’s hottest hires, with pay growth outpacing software engineers, new data shows.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":626,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-627","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-tech"],"yoast_head":"\nDad jeans, big paychecks: hardware engineers are winning the AI boom - American home journals<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/americanhomejournals.com\/?p=627\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Dad jeans, big paychecks: hardware engineers are winning the AI boom - American home journals\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"AI is making hardware engineers some of tech's hottest hires, with pay growth outpacing software engineers, new data shows.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/americanhomejournals.com\/?p=627\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"American home journals\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2026-05-25T13:04:32+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"admin\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"admin\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"1 minute\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/americanhomejournals.com\\\/?p=627#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/americanhomejournals.com\\\/?p=627\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"admin\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/americanhomejournals.com\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/a3bb30439d8074c26cddd2e4af7af957\"},\"headline\":\"Dad jeans, big paychecks: hardware engineers are winning the AI boom\",\"datePublished\":\"2026-05-25T13:04:32+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/americanhomejournals.com\\\/?p=627\"},\"wordCount\":188,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/americanhomejournals.com\\\/?p=627#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/americanhomejournals.com\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2026\\\/05\\\/4d626f6b14ded72c22d1b220dbd37e92.webp\",\"articleSection\":[\"Tech\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/americanhomejournals.com\\\/?p=627#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/americanhomejournals.com\\\/?p=627\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/americanhomejournals.com\\\/?p=627\",\"name\":\"Dad jeans, big paychecks: hardware engineers are winning the AI boom - 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