Firstly, this post is from 2014, and should probably have the title modified (if it even stays). But more importantly, Michael has archives spanning all the wa

Firstly, this post is from 2014, and should probably have the title modified (if it even stays). But more importantly, Michael has archives spanning all the way to 2013, with his 2014 blog posts oddly disappeared. Does he still feel this way, is this an accurate statement in today's economy? I think it's a very controversial statement to say "any" money. Developers do quite well - on average, developers make more than the majority of the population. Some, especially in engineering management, make on par (or more) than some lawyers and even doctors. Just like specialties in law and medicine, some pay more than others because of demands, and those specialties can cycle in demand. For example, radiology is really hot right now and pays very well - it was not as lucrative or selective of a specialty in the 70s and 80s. Similarly, in engineering, choosing a language like Haskell may be highly-specialized, so that if someone needs your skills, they will pay a pretty penny, but amortized over many years, you may make less because the volume of demand doesn't quite match what one is willing to pay. I also think it's a flawed comparison to law and medicine. An example: A lawyer doesn't specialize in English or Spanish. They may know a few languages to talk w/ clients, which is an asset, but they specialize in a discipline of law (e.g. corporate, tax, IP), not on the toolbox used for the law (e.g. reading/writing English). To draw that analogy to programmers, better to know a discipline (e.g. HCI, Machine Learning, Robotics) and then find languages that go with that (e.g. Python & R for Machine Learning, C/C++ for Robotics) than to specialize in a language itself.