Comment by compass_copium

No one is "forcing" you to drive a car to get to work, either. You could walk 20 miles if you live somewhere without decent public transit.

My view is that the author is talking about having a knowledge of career-relevant skills, developed for free.

If you can't develop the skills to be competitive in an interview without using LLMs, then you are forced by societal factors to use the LLMs.