As titles they are often used interchangeably, but the BLS categorizes them separately based on kind of an old-fashioned idea of how software is developed. The

As titles they are often used interchangeably, but the BLS categorizes them separately based on kind of an old-fashioned idea of how software is developed. The distinction is that software developers[1] plan out how software will work and the computer programmers[2] write the code to make it work. The idea that these are separate roles is rapidly going out of fashion in the industry and is already pretty outdated. Only 300k workers are categorized as computer programmers while 1.3 million are categorized as software developers and on top of that the number of software developers is projected to grow by 24% over the next decade while the number of computer programmers is projected to decline by 7%. [1] https://www.bls.gov/ooh/computer-and-information-technology/software-developers.htm https://www.bls.gov/ooh/computer-and-information-technology/... [2] https://www.bls.gov/ooh/computer-and-information-technology/computer-programmers.htm https://www.bls.gov/ooh/computer-and-information-technology/...