I do agree quite a lot with your argument. However, as a former researcher, I would say that you can be creative a lot if you have margin for that. But if you

I do agree quite a lot with your argument. However, as a former researcher, I would say that you can be creative a lot if you have margin for that. But if you only work for enterprises, I agree it is mostly grunt work. I should know, as I've just quit working 8 months for a startup doing backend web dev and got bored and depressed as hell. Now I'm back at my own projects and doing freelance to get the money rolling until one of my projects hits the jackpot, if ever. My opinion, maybe similar to yours, is that professional developers should see programming not as an end on itself but just as a mean. Focus on other areas (engineer, medicine, sports, whatever.) and try to apply your technical skills to fix a problem. Basically, it is what we do when we work for some company, but we should be conscious of that and maybe try to focus on IT + another area instead of just knonwing how to program a computer.. TL-DR: Domain knowledge is a must!