Most highly motivated people can teach themselves IT skills. But IT skills are no longer in such short supply that salaries are crazy high. In the Bay Area in

Most highly motivated people can teach themselves IT skills. But IT skills are no longer in such short supply that salaries are crazy high. In the Bay Area in the late 90s, if you could build and rack a PC you could get a top 10% salary with stock options. Lots of people lifted themselves to the upper-middle class that way. Now, between the high cost of living in cities with a lot of tech jobs, and declining salaries for non-specialized IT work, comparable skills only put you in the middle-middle class. If the trend continues, general IT skills won't pay any more than auto mechanic skills. Which can be decent if you hustle, but it's not the ticket to easy street that it used to be.