Survey: Engineers Want To Code, But Spend All Day on Tech Debt

Software engineers are stuck in a frustrating cycle where they spend only 16% of their time actually coding despite 93% saying it's the most rewarding part of their jobs, with the rest consumed by maintenance tasks, technical debt, and switching between fragmented tools. While AI automation is helping some engineers reclaim up to six hours weekly, trust concerns and workplace restrictions limit broader adoption, though experts predict AI agents could soon handle routine maintenance work autonomously.